Song of Smoke

To watch you walk cross the room in your black corduroys is to see civilization start— the wish- whish-whisk of your strut is flint striking rock—the spark of a length of cord rubbed till smoke starts—you stir me like coal and for days smoulder. I am no more a Boy Scout and, besides, could never put you out—you keep me on all day like an iron, out of habit— you threaten, brick- house, to burn all this down. You leave me only a chimney.