the-fiercest-fables:

Whenever anyone talks about cigarettes, they talk about your lungs — two sticky apricot halves, reeking like burned blood and tar, aging quickly under stress. They tell you, stop killing the birds that push your heart into flight, stop strangling your own air supply like your throat is a damn. Then they move on and talk about your heart, the giant fist god pounded inside of you, just the right size to shove your ten-pint blood from your toes to your head. They say, stop poisoning yourself; eat asparagus, eat sweet potatoes, smother your tongue in oatmeal, mason your stomach with whole grains, and for the love of God, put down that cigarette.

Nobody talks about your tongue.  Nobody says that it’ll only miss the roll of smoke for a few weeks. That it’s nothing more than losing a friend you won’t miss, or being homesick, or that your tongue will learn to taste again, that it will sip soft drink through a straw and begin to exhale without shaping a sigh. They do not pay any attention to your teeth. You bite your nails and they hand you sticks of gum. They are surprised at your bleeding cuticles. They do not understand the way you chew grapes and tear at meat. And when your lips are chapped, they do not see your addiction as a pacifier. They suppose maybe you have a cold, you spent the afternoon kissing snowmen or licking pineapples, contracted teenager herpes. And forget about your feet, the swish, the swish, and tap. They do not anticipate your legs becoming their own beasts, the nicotine emancipation, the nervous wild which rushes to the door; when you catch your heels to the floor and hold them there, pull almonds from your pocket, coat your heart and gnash your teeth.

Tell them something they may understand, say, my hands are missing appendages.