Julian George ~ Girl smoking out the window

                                                                                    ‘Blow some my way’ – Chesterfield

Do you smoke Kools?

‘For peo­ple who like to smoke’

I remem­ber the sub­way ad from a mil­len­ni­um ago,

1990s

Pickup

South Street

IRT

Lots of fun peo­ple in yel­low and white and green at a swell par­ty spilling out into a shiny street, danc­ing in the dark, boo­gieing into the night

(Newport?)

(More No Man’s Land than Shindig! for all the smoke clouds, I wore grandfather’s Expeditionary gas­mask from the Great War, nev­er worn, and was still none the wiser)

(B&H?)

A pic­ture of cool this after­noon, blow­ing rings, send­ing sig­nals, smok­ing to your heart’s content

Or per­haps it’s a Virginia Slim in your suf­fragette fingertips?

‘You’ve come a long way, baby’

I know I have; so many steps a day, around the block, gasp­ing for breath

A bet­ter show every time

(Pall Mall? Silk Cut? American Spirit?)

Just so you know,

I’m not tak­ing the mick;

I’m not going to be a pill and tell you smok­ing kills

(‘It’s Toasted’)

And damp­en my day­dream and your per­fect pleasure,

Exquisite and unsatisfied.

~

Julian George’s work has appeared in Fictionable (forth­com­ing), Exacting Clam (forth­com­ing), the Naugatuck River Review, Perfect Sound Forever, New World Writing, Slag Glass City, Panoplyzine, Ambit, The Journal of Music, Film Comment, The London Magazine, Cineaste and Art Review. His nov­el, Bebe, is out now in CB Editions. He Zooms on jazz for OpenAge.