words

out in the cold, bearing the slight sting
on my skin, the only light from a street lamp
filtering dimly in through a world of leaves
and from my cigarette that burns slow and steady
like life inching forward, an ember separating
itself from the source and twisting upward
before burning out completely and utterly
in the surrounding darkness of the earth.

it is a part of me, an extra appendage
between stone fingers, a distress signal that
burns in tune with hollow souls,
the only way i can kill oneself
without shame or guilt distorting the act.

it consumes me, and as these words
it has become a quiet cry to those around me,
and likewise resonates with a deep truth
that echoes outward from my heart
though none can bear the frequency.

i am failing with each breath,
a shallow reflection of the child i was once
and of the man i wished to be,
both now fading from view as i stretch
further from enlightenment.

the news trumpets endlessly throughout
my dusty room, driving home with force
every sad thought playing in my head,
eating away at my sense of compassion
and leaving me with an emptiness profound
and deep, measured only by the smoke
from my breaths.

cut from photographs, i have become a saint
of mediocrity and isolation, autonomous
and fascistic with regard to myself,
waving chimneys in the night and leaving
only a thin residue of myself
against the memories of those i’ve loved.

-S.C. Martinez