Barbacue

I sit here

beer in hand

as the charcoal’s

pillow of smoke

dances in the wind,

sometimes hitting

me in the eye, but

I don’t mind the sting.

_

The smoke twirling

in the summer breeze

and the smokey tears

fogging my vision

remind me of my

teenage years when

I angstfully babbled

on and on and on

about seeing god

in my pot smoke.

Christ,

what a pretenious

little shit I was.

_

So many memories

in a pillow of smoke,

that’s not a metaphor

btw.

–

In this smoke

I see my childhood

and in its windy twirl

I see my adolescence.

And next to me

father looks pensively

at his perfectly cured

St. Louis cut

sizzling over the embers.

There I see my future.

All the senses

are satisfied,

even taste.

“You can’t eat smoke?”

You idiot,

what the fuck do you think

barbacue is?