Black.

It covers the imperfections and the happiness and the loneliness.

A cold walk through the city park.

You're tripping over your feet again.

The black dress shoes you polished yesterday look like they've been forgotten in your dusty closet for weeks.

More money down the drain.

More screams running through your pipes.

And you pull your pipe from your black, slick coat pocket

And lite up.

Your wife will cry and say you're  killing yourself.

And you'll say you're dead already.

Black

And white.

You saw her on a cold, dreary day.

White,

Pale,

Porcelain.

Red lips

And a tan coat.

She's reading up the world's mistakes and smiling.

Smiling

Seemed foreign.

Something

You remembered from your glory days.

You were happy. 

Remember happy?

One foot in front of the other.

Take another breath of smoke.

The coughs and the darkness are

like slowly dying.

She spreads her long legs in front of her.

Designer heels.

Covered, frail fingers.

Something

About this porcelain woman.

She didn't seem

Breakable.

She was pale and frail

But smiling.

Your weakness and her effortlessness

Sparked something other than your cigarette.

You'll go home and you'll remember the first taste of your wife's lips.

You'll remember the first time you had enough money to buy that old suit.

It seemed so new then.

So unbreakable.

You're breakable.

How can someone made of broken porcelain still stand up tall?

Maybe they start with finding their pieces and pulling them back together.