I Smoke a Cigarette When Someone Dies

the swamp green eyes

the cracking skin on your pale lips

the I’m going to be okay speech

the morphine iwuvu

the wails filling my morning ears

the wrinkled flesh relaxing

the still bones

the garbage bag they put you in 

the last corner I saw you turn

the tears that wet my cotton shirt

the tree where your ashes are the soil

the hawk perched on its branch

the feather at my feet

I lift this cigarette to my lips 

and see your face in the smoke.