I have a pack of smokes

The first 789 times    
I quit smoking    
had defining moments    
of crises or boredom    
or whatever weak-bitch  
excuse I used to have    
to pull over and buy a pack  
so I could smoke  
   
just one  
   
and fuck it tasted like shit.    
 
Every time, that first one was shit.    
 
Flavored with the guilt from breaking    
my fucking vow,    
the way my head swam,  
and my chest clenched    
in a nightmare realization    
that I took a buttery slip    
down a mountain  
I took my entire life to scale    
   
but never again  
   
Every fucking time    
I'd be ripping the end off    
a carton in three days or less    
the burn gone, the head swim gone
the guilt explained away  
in narcissistic self-mutilation  
    
and I'd exist for  
the absolute need to    
pull poison into my body    
just to feel    
normal again    
   
Every fucking time,    
I'd end up chasing death    
faster than I had before I quit    
 
as if my attempt to get clean    
made me crave the dirt.  
   
Made me crave the fatal    
taste of ashes and disappointment    
   
made me prove the    
fuckers who beat down my    
mind-body-soul  
were all right    
 
I guess.    
I like to hear their spindly voices    
whisper  
about how fucking    
awful I really am  
   
and  
   
there's a gleeful little piece of me    
that uses telling terms like    
"I deserve this"    
to frame my entitlement to a break    
a relief  
a reprieve    
a bit of release    
after being such a diligent cog    
in this fucking stupid system.    
   
because secretly    
I think    
I do  
and not in a way that    
brings clarity,    
but a way that etches    
daggers of fatalistic bullshit    
into my corneas.    
   
I hide my past filthy habits each day when    
I rub cream into the little    
wrinkles at the corners of my mouth    
from pursing my lips    
and I peel white strips    
off foil packets to try to    
peel back years on my teeth    
and I run extra miles to turn back    
the time on my lungs    
and I get a fucking chest X ray    
to make sure it didn't get me this time    
   
I cover and correct and live in fear that    
I killed my fucking self  
   
like they all knew I would    
 
Every part of me knows    
if I ever pick it up again...    
   
even just once.    
   
even just a puff    
   
   
even just.    
   
one.    
   
Means I fucking chase my own demise.    
Means I know I'm finally not smart enough    
young enough    
cool enough    
slick enough    
to get away with it forever.    
   
Means I want to go out like this.    
   
   
   
love.    
   
You stand so close to me    
as I tamp this square box down.    
The slip of cellophane
jitters against our sweaty palms  
and I meet your lips  
thinking nothing past  
( no-yes-no-yes-yes-no-goddamn))  
 
how the bulge in the    
back pocket of your    
pants looks like a    
zippo