The Color of Ash
by Leah Hale
We always met on the rust-tinted porch,
a pipe in my hand, you
with a bag of chocolate tobacco,
and we'd incinerate there.
Our bodies smoldered
down to ash, leaving only
the occasional hum of our voices
to rise in the leaves.
We were older back then
than we've ever been since,
and between the drag of our steady hands,
there was only the cherry glow in the bowl.
That was before the sun
rose on our black-and-blue mornings,
before I blew our conversations out of my
lungs,
before we stopped cutting our coffee
with whiskey, before our sking turned
the color of ash.
From Share: Art and Literary Magazine, Spring 2009.
by Leah Hale
We always met on the rust-tinted porch,
a pipe in my hand, you
with a bag of chocolate tobacco,
and we'd incinerate there.
Our bodies smoldered
down to ash, leaving only
the occasional hum of our voices
to rise in the leaves.
We were older back then
than we've ever been since,
and between the drag of our steady hands,
there was only the cherry glow in the bowl.
That was before the sun
rose on our black-and-blue mornings,
before I blew our conversations out of my
lungs,
before we stopped cutting our coffee
with whiskey, before our sking turned
the color of ash.
From Share: Art and Literary Magazine, Spring 2009.