There is something strangely poetic about the act of smoking a cigarette. This claim sounds gauche, maybe a little pretentious. It sounds oddly, like a justification, for why one should keep up an objectively terrible habit. However, in the mornings, when my eyes are still sleep filled and hazy, and the sun has crested over the rows of buildings neighbouring my house, I cannot help but feel somewhat holy. The temporary nature of a cigarette feels like capturing yourself in resin, or perhaps more similarly to molasses. The world stills, or slows, to the time it takes from the first spark of a lighter to the yellowing butt that is held surely between fingers. I am, as a principle, gluttonous. My hunger for things is continual, aggressive, and untameable in most moments. I am bred for overconsumption. Everything I have and see, I want in excess, overwhelming and whole. My jaw is loose at its hinge, and my mouth is ready for a feast I have skinned bare myself. There is a forced portion given to me when I smoke. There is the now, the singular moment, in which I become confined to. Inhale. Pause. One action, followed to completion. I could have another cigarette following the one I am currently occupied with, yet still, I would have to finish the action of smoking the first before doing so. In this addiction, I have somehow bred restraint. I could smoke hundreds of cigarettes, one after the other, and yet, even in my gluttony, I can only have one at a time. I have dieted my desire. Scheduled. Controlled. In the minute before I have finished smoking, I have tamed the beast.
Growing up religious, you become accustomed to the act of ritual, in whatever form that may take. There is a rigid structure, a way in which something must be done in order to receive sanctification. My God died, and so must I, even if it is the inevitability of the flesh alone. Gluttony is a mortal sin. Lust. Greed. I am afflicted with iniquity. I feel, and then I stretch that feeling to the greatest extent. As did Lucifer. So, here I must tame the spirit to prevent the fall. I have abandoned mass times, but I am religious in my attendance to tobacco. I rid myself of emotion, and I operate on instinct. Like the shaking of the body during prayer, so do my lungs heave. My fingers twitch, once, twice. I cycle air like incense in pews. I am prostrate to a hurt that saves. Stigmata. I am diseased, but I know it is for a greater cause. If Jesus were to abandon the cross, I would not be saved. If I were to abandon this affliction, my extremity would kill me rather.
janainaart
jbbartram-illu
dededos
origamiaround
romaincrisis
ellievsbear
snowghoul
