Another Addict Poem by Gordon D Wilkinson

How incredibly painful this is
Wanting to cough and not wanting to
Knowing coughing will only bring back the pain
Fighting for breath
Nurse comes trying to bring relief
Watching you buck in pain trying to stop it
Stomach walls racked in so many pains at once
Gasping always the gasping
Like a fish out of water trying to breathe
If only smokers knew what lays ahead
Cold turkey for the drug addict
With the gift of cleansing comes health
Smokers’ cold turkey so different
Damage, irreversible damage
Hidden scars that can never heal
Painful the cough, nebulised to submission
Temporary fix for the pain
Steady the drip of sodium chloride into a vein
Facemask pumping
Motors pushing a mixture up the nostrils
Taking a little of the pain
Hours trickle into more pain
Where is the nearest bus to jump in front of?
Ending the pain with one swoop
Ungrateful I know but none the less felt
Fighting on seems silly
Counting the pain again and again
Must be part of mans will to succeed
I hope it is worth it all
Ask in a few months, maybe the pain will have gone
Nurses rush doing what they can
Addicts do not see the face
Do not see the compassion
Just anything, that stops the aches
Un-thanked they stick to their task
It does not matter you did this to yourself
With the gratification of the smoke inside your lungs
They do not care, simply giving assistance and relief
Doctors wander in look and prod
Listening each side of the chest
Top to bottom, back to front
Deciding on a course of action to take away the wheezing
Alleviate the pain
The antibiotics pumped in
Still the pain hidden, just for a moment
Swamped by the drugs
Time to feel almost human again
If only for the briefest of moments
Shaking, not from the cold
The druggies shivering of deliverance
Smokers in essence just being another junkie
Addicts by legality
Buzz addicts of tobacco
More addictive than class A drugs