joey k poetry

Let me level with you, this was unbearable.
Let me tell you, these things should be illegal.
Let me ask you, do you think oncologists smoke cigarettes?

Withdrawals. A word cannot do the feeling justice.
Words are meant to describe.
Nobody should even experience this, even in text.

Cigarettes had a grasp on me.
The fingers and muscle of which I saw glaringly as I tried to distance myself from the womb of nicotine.
A desolate field met me, signs scattered, warning,
“Turn Back!” “No Hope”
I saw men hanged, burning bodies, I saw my own face on dying men
as withdrawals convinced me it was cigarettes or violent deaths.

There is no light, there is no tunnel.
You travel on aching knees over uneven land,
knowing not where to go, how to cope.
You scream and apologize.
You shatter yourself.
And this will make you stronger than ever before.