shifter

The cigarette is analogous to what linguists call a shifter, like the word I ; this device for expressing the irreducible particularity of my innermost self is universally available to every speaker and is thus the least particular thing in the world. The smoker manipulates the cigarette, like the word I, to tell stories to him/herself about him/herself — or to an other.

'Twas ſuch a ſhifter, that if truth were known, / Death was half glad when he had got him down;