Memory Fumes by Tatiana Pahlen

Memory Fumes
Part 2
To My Beloved Father

By Tatiana Pahlen

I tasted nicotine first when I was fourteen.
I waited till my father left the room
to reach for a smoldering butt,
abandoned in the ashtray to die naturally.
I puffed it hard and learnt to love the lightness in my head,
before my father entered the crime scene,
where I stood like a cornered deer
with exposed lungs ablaze.
I threw the evidence back on the table,
hitting the ashtray and missing by an inch.
It bounced off the side —
"close but no cigar!"
It landed on the white-n-crispy cloth
and smoked it through, while spewing brown stains.

My father, "Mr. Nitpick," observed the cloth
like a haunted hawk.
He inspected his ashtray and found no cracks,
before his brown eyes fixed on my mouth,
then on my blown-up cheeks.
He broke the silence.
"Do you smoke?"
He peered directly in my eyes.
My skin turned white.
While petrified, I expressed a shameful courage
and shouted back.
"You’re out of your mind!"
With every word the smoke accompanied my ardent gestures
that sat in my lungs and longed to break free.
The fumes kept coming out of my mouth
like a five-headed dragon,
fogging up his stunned, impatient face…
I bounced the punishment by chance and got away unscathed.

Years later we shared the same ashtray
like two smoking pals.
The bond between us grew stronger
when we were lighting from each other's butts.
He couldn't quit, even when diagnosed with cancer
that grabbed him by his throat.
He lasted two more years against all odds.
We walked a mile together — our last,
an hour before he died.
His once muscular, head-turning frame
was carrying skin and bones.
He suddenly recalled the day
He caught me at the table with the burning cloth.
Ultimately I said: "I'm sorry," and he laughed.
Right then I promised never to smoke again.
He took me in his feeble arms and we both cried.
I felt again as if I was fourteen -- lost, forgiven and dismayed.
That was three decades ago, since my dad passed on.
I got his blessings with his last goodbye
to enjoy my life anew,
craving no longer for cigarettes or stogies.

July 16, 2006