Ms. Rhythm makes a comeback

She came into the night and this light dying and my heart failing. After hours of screaming silence, she winks and whirls into the river, as though escape by water could excuse her crime. She didn't leave a calling card or a thoughtful hand-written note. I scour the bank upon a skiff, a boat beneath me to float that way and this, the merest whiff, perfume in a jar in my memory, across the ocean she's laughing or crying. I asked her mother her new address; I carried a photograph of her silk black skirt, I don't remember clothes but I remember certain textures, powders or sensations of heat. She was a criminial no doubt, word was out in the town, most wanted thief, most feared devil, most loved siren, most certain death.