Lately I’ve been dreaming of a last cigarette.
Let me tell you about what I mean.
A last cigarette could be lots of things.
It could be….
It could be that heart attack that kills
the senator in bed with his mistress.
Or it could be our midnight supper,
Lovingly prepared by the cook at the roadside diner.
A last cigarette could be a dream,
or even that proverbial moment of bliss,
right before the moment of death,
when our lives become completely clear,
just at the moment when we lose all control.
A last cigarette could be anything at all
in our entire world that we want it to be.
The only price we’d need to pay would be,
that last bit of blackening deep inside our alveoli,
where our desires ultimately foreshadow our doom
and our departure.
Like the fast food hamburger,
or the carbon dioxide motor-car,
everyone knows exactly what he’s buying when you get right down to it.