steph raze you're on the cover of every album you gave me. one self_portrait inked with black ballpoint. two more smeared onto canvas coated with gypsum and chalk. if i take them in sequence, i can watch you disappear. your hair purple plumes of smoke. one eye hairless and wide. the other heavy-lidded and lashed. a lion for a headband. a raven for a cap. a star pinned to your chest. and then you're nothing from the nose down. so many songs named for the scars they gave you and what you had to walk through to write them. "burn mark". "sewn dark". "birthday". "fever". "vanity". i'd forgotten how much i loved your voice. it's all that's left of you now. 250302 what's it to you? who go blather from