He Died, and They Still Breathe
The man who banned cigarettes
died this morning.
No smoke in his lungs.
No fire in his fingers.
Only silence.
Only breathlessness
that wasn’t self-inflicted.
He stood on a balcony
and said:
“No more holy smokes.”
He meant it.
He ended their sales,
quietly,
in a city built on centuries of rituals.
And yet—
he's gone.
While they remain:
the ones who sell breath for profit,
the ones who burn lungs for margins,
the ones who lit childhoods
on fire.
Maybe death is not the curse.
Maybe survival is.
Because sometimes,
the ones who protect lungs
go early,
and the ones who poison them
live long enough
to cash in on every cough.