Heartburn (ROUND 2)
Let’s workshop this poem about the moment violence ricochets back into boyhood, where a hot brass casing awakens the shooter's memory of forever trailing after the kid who could hold a perfect wheelie
scent of the day: Fleur Tabac, by Miyaz
This is a jasmine-oud among several in my collection breaking the rose-oud norm, perhaps most notably Nilmalee (ointmented female perineum), Homa (fermented-milk goat curry), Arsalan (cheesy cyst superating infection) / Indeed, this belongs to the category of jasmine-oud industrial fragrances along with Oud Sinharaja (Aqua Net in an 80s mall salon). / Even more specifically, this belongs to the category of jasmine-oud industrial-rubber fragrances like Thichilla (semi-deflated mildwey bouncy house). / But instead of having the bright and ebullient tropical vibe of Sinharaja or Thichilla, Fleur Tabac is dark and brooding and its rubbery nature—boat epoxy meets beach ball meets gucci guilty bandaid—veers hard in the one-of-a-kind direction of tackle boxes of creek fisherman. /
It smells, to get as specific as I can, like the those packages of scented bait, Powerbait, where these squishy-gooey-gummy plastic worms (some with ribbon-tail or curl-tail design and with embedded flecks that glint in sunlight) have been impregnated with a supercharged formula that radiates the processed fish aroma of hatchery chum: pungent, oily, savory, fermented in a cheesy way that trout and catfish love—all this decaying marine protein smell, a meaty and brothy umami (like soy sauce blended with cat kibble and rancid butter and licorice spice), overtop chemically-potent industrial plastics (something between boat epoxy and an inflated beach toy). /
this scent opens with a proteinic fervor of fermented fish meal, wet polymer, and sunlight-warmed dock wood. / It is confrontational, but oddly nostalgic: I get marine feels despite the otherwise early profile (although perhaps some ambroxan is used like it seems to be in Thichilla, perhaps its closest companion) and I get memories of bait shops and summer mornings thick with the hum of insects. / I was expecting the assam to be shitty—if anything it is fermented with earthy-chocolate hints of worm-body decay (think: the dapper worm of Figment Man now rotting). /
As the spicy volatile top fades, something deeper, more contemplative, emerges: a tobacco-like warmth, equal parts fermented leaf and boat resin. / The scent begins to whisper of pipe tobacco left in a tackle box—molasses-dark, slightly smoky, with a whisper of licorice, cedar sawdust, and greasy metal./ There’s a strange dignity to it, like a cologne for retired anglers who’ve smoked cherry blends for decades and still keep their waders by the door—indeed, people from a far get a cherry woody smell /
Hours later, what remains is as alluring as a fish lure: a plasticized amber glow. / The fishiness recedes into a dry, tarry, almost creosote sweetness—reminiscent of old humidor wood, oxidized oil, and the faint ozone of creek water on vinyl. / It’s as if the scent has aged into something both mechanical and organic, caught between industrial nostalgia and biological persistence—exactly like Powerbait /
It might seem strange that this is, first and foremost, a tobacco scent when it is so clearly creek-fishing-tackle-box Powerbait, but I do get tobacco from multiple directions even so—the main overlap being that the fermented proteins of the lure align with the fermented leaf of tobacco and that the oily plasticizers of the lure align with the resinous and smoky base of aged tobacco products). /
First, fishing has always been associated with tobacco for me because my dad, who took me fishing, chainsmoked the whole time. / So tobacco impressions might ride on the coattails of any scent that brings me to fishing memories—I believe Honour Man does that merely by bringing me to the sea./
Second, one of the defining characteristics of cured tobacco—especially Burley or Cavendish—is its fermented, proteinic sweetness: that faintly yeasty, haylike, molasses-and-ammonia mixture, which we get here and in actual PowerBait—both cured tobacco and Powerbait have a core of dark maltiness, the same family of smells that bridge barn-cured leaf, fermented grains, and animal feed. /
Third, PowerBait’s formula uses oily binders and plasticizers that lend a tar-like, resinous base note not unlike the smell of pipe tobacco jar resin or even old humidor glue and cedar—this resin-plastic mixture giving off a burnt-sweet, phenolic warmth that parallels the smell of freshly opened tobacco tins. /
Fourth, PowerBait often has an anise edge (black licorice or fennel) and that his right in line with how some pipe tobaccos are cased (and is what Zarokian emphasized in the still unbeatable masterpiece Royal Tobacco). /
Fifth, rancid nuttiness (like old walnut shells, molasses, or fermented honey)—tobacco leaf during fermentation and PowerBait both pass through that zone (a territory where castoreum, coumarin, and tonka bean notes sit). /
Sixth, the industrial plastic undertone—the “tackle box” smell—has surprising parallels to the burnt phenols and creosote found in dark-fired tobacco or cigar wrappers: the faint whiff of smoky solvent that rides under PowerBait’s scent can recall the chemical warmth of a freshly lit cigar or sweet tar on old briar pipes. /
Tacklebox, melted plastic, fishing lure, rubber gasket—because Miyaz’s perfumes are heavy in natural oils and solvents (often DPG or ethanol with essential resins), they can pull out the plasticizer odor of the decant container more aggressively than lighter designer perfumes and so I wondered if that might be explaining the tacklebox and rubber worm impressions. / But now that I have a bottle—yes, the tacklebox is still there: it is mainly the tobacco that is acting this way I gather.
Heartburn
Tinnitus eating chain creaks
as you pedal back to grab
the shells (still warm), memories
reflux like burp acid: the dead,
before blunts rusted boyhood
summer, riding wheelies
unbroken for blocks on this
very bike—you, the one kid
without a smile, trailing after.