Dark Habits Poem by Mark Heathcote

You painted the twilight with an oily rag
roadside in the puddles. What a dark ire
when you sucked jerked on that first drag.
Growing up can be something - truly - dire.

Crimson and black, what part would you give back?
Were you, dear, a ripe, sweet fruit ready to fall?
If-say, you were in the hold of the inside track?
What bit pray - would you save - child to reinstall?

If you had the knowhow of life, how it's bitterly gored
if you were like a tattered kite in a storm,
dancing only to falter and on your reward.
Would you saviour your soul, something like its norm?

Before those lungs expire on that final breath,
would you quit those dark habits and cheat death?