Your hands are rough as sandpaper.
I know because I can feel them
When you press deep down
Into the bone,
My shoulder blades aching with
(The knowledge of)
Something familiar.
Something warm and close.
The smell of the smoke
As it leaks in tendrils
From the mouth
Of the licking flame.
The ecstasy keeps you sane.
It keeps you from rolling under
The wheels of a great locomotive
Howling prehistorically
As it greedily tongues up the landscape
Into its coal-black mouth.