lakeside beneath your million faces i'll explain the intricacies of juniper berries how centuries of rituals are encapsulated within distillates and how it doesn't matter because in essence it is just a vessel for what i'm putting us through it ebbs with slick swigs — twice for you oily, tastes like herbal fire, why drink it straight then cause i feel it muddles its shape and purpose too much, but that's just what i feel not what i read, and do we ever really get to the core of things anyway even now, whole centuries leading up to this talk on the rooftop overlooking staggered architecture finding holes in the shingles can i bum another smoke i left my pack at the restaurant, anyways, in these 6 hours I feel like nothing else is there beautifully so, only to return empty handed keys lost tied in a familiar knot, almost choking well — no. actually choking on dust ripped off authentic arabesque have i told you the streets of Italy looked different back then now we're here and it's not the same how often do i say that even it's not the same, it's not the same i already knew you were different i already knew how predictable it was to see you cast no real shadows even though your face is right here, she wasn't you, you weren't her, whatever so here we we are, miss jasmine, miss foxglove, miss cobalt and miss cherry red, welcome to my expert panel on the intricacies of botany and the human experiences on the cycle of lust and the instabilities we pull into the vortex it creates, for it to collapse in our million faces as we decide to push through the surface, the other side of the mirror where i swear i've seen the same things happen twice as slowly in the same direction