The Death Wisher

Lying next to him at night she hears him,

spluttering, convulsing,

his sickness never giving him peace.

From the depths of sleep,

a ruthless tidal wave of medical misery crashes over him.

First the violent heaving of his chest,

the struggle for breath, the clawing dryness of his throat.

Then the fumbling and lunging in the dark, the patting of pockets.

Now comes the rhythmic clicking of his medication,

first blue,

then brown.

As profoundly inhaled as an opium pipe,

and every bit as intoxicating.

He is a devout asthmatic,

but he genuflects only to his beloved cigarettes.

The thought of cigarettes raises him from his fitful sleep in the morning,

sends him off to tortured sleep at night.

Dozens of them daily,

sometimes two at once,

and always taken with passion.

They have all of them constructed his character,

the blue inhalers, the brown inhalers, the Marlboro reds,

his darling cigarettes, the panacea, the treat, the fairy floss at the fair,

his unconditional love.

He can never sit in a concert hall or theatre,

so he is always scornful of those who do,

“Petit bourgeoisie!”

The death wisher tells you that this is what he truly wants.

That a life of thwarted desire is not a life.

But what of addiction, she screeches?

What of illness?

And death?

He shrugs, manly, nonchalant, while apathy, the invisible dictator,

shapeshifts in the base of his spine.

Cold-blooded and watchful as a snake,

it masquerades as free will,

masquerades as passion. 

The death wisher is easily deceived, the weak always are. ◊