“It’ll be okay,” they say to the flames,

then sit and wait for it to be.

“I can’t believe that happened to them,

but it would never happen to me.”

“I’ll be saved, you’ll see,” they insist,

to the room thickening with smoke.

Eying the exit expectantly,

smiling as soot lines their throat.

“Any minute now,” they croak,

haplessly grasping at ghosts

just past the end of their rope.

Committing the eighth and deadliest sin,

the obfuscating anamoly of hope.