I She emerges Four, five, six Times a day maybe For a five minute escape I know because I smell the smoke Acrid Chafing the crystal air She fills the street with it Her deep blue pluming despair Blow out Breathe in Each puff a day she’d rather forget Yet the days stain her like tar does Fingertips II  Wouldn’t she like to open her mouth And let her worries fly out Through a rent in the air Tiny black sparrows stretching their wings until White doves fill the sky But they sit and sink rough talons into soft flesh Dance like devilish jokers upon the tight line that is her lips III I can see by the way she stubs the butts out Against the littered pavement Where turning autumn leaves congeal with the discarded debris of a thousand stilted souls By the way she wears that frown Criss-crossing her forehead By the way she leans into the wind Pulling her jacket tighter Trying to protect the chest she poisons from the wind She …