Smoking

I used to smoke fireworks.

Not the kind that shattered summer nights. 

 The honking big ones, mortars in the sky,

Coloring clouds with sulfurous reds and yellows.

I used to smoke like sparklers. 

Hold the metal tubes in my teeth

And singe my mustache off

With each inhale. 

I used to wheeze with those little pods,

Packets of black powder

That your friends could throw at you

And pop like gunshots. 

I could crush roman candles between my lips

And shoot my name to the stars. 

But that's not why I did it. 

Your eyes reflecting each tiny moment

The flashes and bangs and whimpers

As you twined fingers through mine. 

I used to smoke fireworks. 

But I don't breathe the way I used to.

And every song in the sky has dimmed,

To peter out, like you,

As a Catherine wheel in the empty spaces above.