M opens the pouch, begins roll-
ing the first cigarette like a hop
stake along which he’ll
string a sequence to drink by
until, after the ones we’ve bummed,
he’s down to smoking ashes
in napkins, the aroma saved
in his hair. I believed
it was not harmful. In signal
yellow paper G rolls a joint
to face the last
names of stones on the hill.
He leans on the angel’s
low-draped back. We guess
why she was white and turned black.
When it passes to us
soon we all feel the same.
And H, inviting us in on a
miserable day, grouses at
the squirrels and thunder:
it is his birthday—
C’s brought him the smoke cure
of a smuggled cigar,
of a mouth and its fire.
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