Surgeon General’s Loss

Smoking causes cancer

and according to Brooke Shields,

“Spoils your looks.”

I hate the way Dad

smokes and quits and smokes again.

But rumor has it,

smoking can make you skinny.

to hell with pink lungs

you need thin thighs.

I sit down on the grass alone

with a pack of super-skinny slims

I hope will make me

super-skinny

slim.

I practice lighting up,

pretend I’m

an actress playing a role

sophisticated heroine

in black and white

or heroin addict

in Technicolor,

trying to recapture the magic

of my hollow-eyed stare.

I push past the burning,

the urge to cough,

pulling and squinting

until I imagine it looks cool.

But the puff-yourself-slim plan

doesn’t work on me

and smoking is

just another

failed attempt

on my long list of

failed attempts

to lose weight.