She only smokes when she’s spiraling or performing.
Usually both.
Says she loves a dramatic flourish—
exhales like a closing line,
laughs like a scratched record.

You’ll meet her at a party that’s already ending.
She'll kiss you like she’s trying to delete her own mouth,
like you’re just the eraser.
She'll leave before sunrise
because she hates how the light arrives slowly,
and can’t stand watching the world wake up
and not call her back.

If you ask what she’s looking for,
she’ll point at the exit sign and say,
“Something with the same glow.”
You’ll think she’s flirting,
but she’s actually just listening hard
for the next excuse to leave.

If you ask for her number,
she’ll give you a poem,
one with no punctuation
and a key taped to the back.
Not to her place.
To your undoing.

She tells stories like she’s double-daring
the past to contradict her.
Someone once told her
she seems like the kind of girl
who disappears mid-sentence.
She said,
“Only when the sentence forgets I started it.”

She collects promises like matchbooks:
already scorched,
still reeking of places
that almost got her to stay.

At dinner parties,
she compliments your cutlery
then slices the conversation open.
Asks what you hate most about your mother
before the bread hits the table.

You’ll want to know her real name.
She’ll say something like,
“It’s carved into a tree somewhere,”
before you realize
you’ve already said it in your sleep.

And when you find the poem she gave you
weeks later,
crumpled in your coat pocket,
you’ll swear you hear her laugh
when you read the last line out loud:
“Don’t follow. I haunt better when I’m alone.”

She’s the reason
someone, somewhere,
is learning the difference
between being worshipped
and being watched.

And when she finally leaves—
because she always does—
you’ll swear you still smell
ozone, orange blossom,
and the beginning of a very pretty ruin.

She leaves you rearranged—
not broken,
just fluent in a dead dialect
that only speaks in warning signs.

You’ll start writing things
you don’t remember feeling
and calling it healing.
But it’s just possession.
The poem wasn’t for you.
It was the door.

She doesn’t burn bridges.
She just convinces them to jump.

She never really leaves.
She just sets the room on fire
and watches who runs toward the smoke.

(And if she ever comes back—
and she will—
don’t blink.
She’s made of edits,
and she notices cuts.)

in better times, I remember I
began getting quite arrested, like
a ****** susp., by
Harmonía, which keeps serving
to this day as a source of both psychic sunlight
and real enjoyment (sometimes)
which is somewhat funny co[ɑ]mbined
with the fact it was a summer month I
started getting more in—volved in thI̲s diversion
summer twenty fourteen
which means she's something I have bE̲E̲n exploring
for... um... already more than
a decade, like rotten souls of autocratic rogues
["decayed"]
but it's a mite bigger story
given the fA̲ct I'd known
and been sort of into her some years before then
she can be so diverse, from natural
to artificial & including parts of both
plenty of heartbeat types & tempos
and vibes: from nice & mellow
to harsh & evil, from bright to dismal
from refined & regal to energized & feral
she can pep up automotive-buzz-replete strolls
she's there for you in times you feel low
and any kind of insult is something she won't
ever do, unlike a lo[ɑ]t of people; I can hardly be called
jolly, like a harlequin lo[ɑ]cked within walls
of a go[ɑ]ddamn mental
["Harley Quinn"; "Gotham"]
asylum, but, like an environment fa[ɛ]natic
in a paradisiacal la[ɛ]nd replete
with scenes of natural grace, I'm pleased
["blissed"]
that I̲ had a cha[ɛ]nce to be
introduced to her; and all the gO̲O̲d 'bout her
cited through the verse is why I'm glued to her
not a single day of mine is thrO̲U̲gh sans her
but if you think I'm alluding to[—]wards
a close other, you have sure
misunderstood the verse (some of it)
[Unlike Pluto has a tune being, as it's stated by him, "a love song as a metaphor for alcoholism"]
[it's called "Ethel", which is a homophone for "ethyl"]
————————————————————————————————
for I'm not one with a people-oriented frame
of mind, but a music nerd
with a broad extent of taste
for music, but one whO̲ prefers
mostly middle-paced
and boomy forms
of it, such as midtempo bass
midtechno, EDM glitch hop, moombahcore
drift phonk "*******", like a *****'s brain
moombahton, & 2000s reggaeton
but some years ago, when old & new reports
of injustices of the human world
next to the discontent of daily adult-hood were serv—
—ing as ****** fuel in terms
of the ignition of the stupid urge
to get something (boo!) destroyed
to bring against injustice-contributing jerks retribution earned
a craze for more dark-sounding, brutal sorts
of tunes was formed as a substitution for
destruction, like any amusement's purp.
["distraction"; "purpose"]
along with music, another gO̲O̲d means for
getting through the murk
has been, like when a whip's coming thrO̲U̲gh keen curves
sideways with its wheels sliding through the course
of it, creative writing, putting words (mislead)
["creative riding"; "ᵖᵤᵗᵢⁿ words"]
into this seductive-looking form (indeed)
————————————————————————————————
and I really was thinking after the last done work
(that killing joke tale)
that I won't manage to craft one more (usual thoughts)
took 'round three & a half months burned (for the most part)
and the thought of o[ɑ]bligation to wha[ʌ]t's been saving
me from ending up in a darker place in
order to undertake an—other rhyme creation
hopefully, like that racing co[ɑ]ntest on Terminal
Island, I'll have some more to show
that's something I am not sure of, though
["mortal show"; the "Death Race" show from the same-titled movie]

Wanna be pervasive on thoughts?
On carte blanche?
I'll give you a perverted stream
And force you to wade in it.

I'll tease you with wonder,
I'll keep from you the infinite.
Enjoy your *******?
Have another pile of manure!

Fission, fusion.
Derision after derision.
Creation, destruction.
Degredation after degredation.
Combination, seperation.
Decay after decay.

Fusion, fission.
Praise after praise.
Destruction, creation.
Amelioration after amelioration.
Splitting, collaboration.
Growth after growth.

I know only
That I know nothing!

You couldn't tell if I was crazy
If you were even any sane!
And you're not.
You couldn't tell if I was sane
If you weren't any crazier!
But you are!

Does it hurt your head to think?
Why, let it stop!
Does it hurt your chest to breathe?
Why, just quit it!

Soemone else can do that for you,
You can just take the credit!
For if the heart should ache
You're better off without it!

But serious-
The cloud tells the rain
What is & is not water.
Do the falling droplets care?
"What are these foreign definitions?"

The destination is the same,
Their own priorities remain,
And perspective is unchanged.

These strange properties,
Words themselves as elements
When strung together by sentence.
Is repentance within a reflection?
Redemption by sight through a drop of liquid?

What grippings within these pensions,
What potential within these tensions,
What whippings within these conventions.

By the accounts of every party attended,
What stern material has been cobbled.
Yet, poverty is worn stronger.
That which itself is as the weather,
I think it closer to trinkles
Than shine & twinkle.

What do the poor pour?
What do the bums toast?
What do the homeless shower?

A buddy of mine
Left really only notes.
Another was a rotten cheater.
I knew one that liked to play with guys,
Knew one that liked masks & needles.
Comes what? What goes? Who knows.

It can't be worse than before,
But that's not something you remember.
Of course, I mean, not someone you know.