Kippered

 

Kippered

 

 

First thing every morning,

I think not of you. Unkippered,

my washed eyes flicker open,

blink darkness into soggy focus:

fingers snag on fluorescent lighter,

pillowing pink back drowns in bed,

as flamenco flames billow,

dancing hot, cha-chars

my fingers and thumbnail.

 

Barely light my cigarette,

on the third or fourth attempt.

Suck on it, chest deep,

release lungful of smoky hiss,

will serve instead of your kiss.

 

Later, thick struggles with quilt,

heaves over gilt heavy eyes,

lost in thinking - is there honey,

or coffee - still for tea?

And sinking back into silt,

unmoved; you move me not,

unbesotted, unbewitched,

and totally unhooked,

never will my cobwebbed mind

relinquish another guilty look.

 

Finally, squinting at clock,

the unflicked hangnail ash

burns my chest in shock,

I rub lunar landscape pocks,

taste a scent of singeing hair,

gusting on reconditioned air,

to fill those half lusty sails.

 

You do not fill my kippered brain

with your memories walking undead,

and tomorrow, I’ll unremember you again,

smoke circles in crumbling crimson red.