there's that thing, she says, that thing that makes bats fly sideways and that makes train whistles blow late into the night. things that make the world seem less like swimming through a constant stream of turpentine and the memory of shark's fins against toe nails. i've spent the night with a butterfly in the stomach of a great white making daisy chains. tapping out songs on soft insides of a belly wall. this won't be the last time i outline the shape of your face with fire against the side of an abandoned building. or scream your name from the 9th street bridge. to the tune of the trains running on rails and the flash of the flame when it's hot. that thing, she says, slowly audible like the am radio station in your adolescent parent's car, something about a horse with no name, that thing. she wants to scream. above the wheels against iron and the infinite abyss. but even if she scrambled and fell. that thing. that thing. would around your ears soundless fall. to crack and strain like a voice full up on sickness. you couldn't ever see.