Hard - Intellectual

This line doubles as both a metaphor and a physical boast. Poppy frequently wears sharp nail extensions to the extent that it’s become a signature part of her look.

poppy has always loved gender-bending in her music and even in old interviews and videos where she often suggested that gender itself was outdated and on the way out. the image of a man working on his car is a classic masculine trope, for it to come out of a petite woman is humorous.

elaborating on her self-described ‘hardness’, poppy creates a portrait of herself as rather ruthless and unemotional. she accepts no failure in herself (and maybe others) and laughs at darkness as though it bounces right off of her.

This line is Poppy stating that she is too tough to be messed with. She is warning people that if they do mess with her then they will regret it.

far from being an unfortunate choice of wording, this is likely intended to evoke a phallic image, furthering the comical gender-bending the track plays around with in small doses.

the terrified spark is too weak and poppy, in her strength, is forced to bear the weight brought on by their inadequacy.

it could actually be that poppy is referring not to one but to multiple past partners in this song, with the insinuation being that their dependence on her has made her into a woman who is emotionally blank and untrusting.

she is referring to a relationship here. the “you” is most likely also the spark she refers to earlier in the track.

in contrast to herself, the relationship poppy held with this person was not tough, despite appearances implying otherwise.

a “spark”, being a speck of light, is in contrast to the darkness she describes in the prior line. presumably she is describing a person or people who either are or were in here life here, and posits herself as an almost all-seeing void who is enveloping in its blackness and yet in its hardened perfection sees this light/person “reaching” – perhaps with malintent – long before they can get to her.

reference to having a “hardened” perspective or personality, though it is also probably a humorous reference to her increasingly muscular physique as well.

while the tone of this track at times seems on the surface slightly self-aggrandizing, lines like this have a certain damaged quality to them. building off of the imagery of her “hard” body (suspect wording probably intended) and the implication of strength, poppy tells us that she needs the people around her to be the kind of person she could throw. it’s a comical metaphor that belies a kind of sad tendency.