There's been talk of a rape festival in the air for a whole day now. Maybe it's because it's a couple of countries away, but the world flows regardless. Thick air doesn't slow the earth down. The screams of the dead get drowned out by their borders, by the voice of our owners asking for overtime, by the thoughts of where our next meals will come from. Over here, the sun sets, maybe a little more beautifully than usual. The boys play football as the sun's light reclines behind the building. You'd think we were in different worlds the way those boys run freely. I wish my legs could carry me like theirs did. They mustn't have heard the news. Only I seem to carry baggage on my nape. I look up and it's been so long since I've seen the stars, but they are there today. How rude. You'd think they'd have heard that "Immortal" is dead. The irony isn't lost on me but what bothers me more is that we don't know why. I want to know, What makes a young man noose his own neck and leave? We really can't see these things I'm looking at a picture of his and I can't see it in his face. I look forward and a man tells me to pray. He is from a popular cult A smile plastered from ear to ear, he says "Say HU" As if the sound of wind rushing past the ear will carry my hurts away. I take his pamphlet in my right hand and keep on walking Laughing about how he could probably see God with Lenses so thick. Imagine we find God in a pamphlet and 20 minute prayer-song Maybe it is that simple, I'm a little scared. I look back Alex is in the distance He has turned his back on me. That's the only way to walk away. A little over a year ago, he felt safe enough to confide in me that he failed No Nut November. Now we just walk by, I'd be lucky to get a Hi. I still write poetry about him. sometimes. I like to make it abstract so I can pretend he didn't add to my mould. I fear that no matter how far away he walks, he would still be here, the things he left me lying in a corner. Same way his music is still in my library. I mourn a man who is alive. I thank God he's still alive. I look to my side and Abundance is there. She whispers to me how she wants to see me win. I stare into her eyes and watch them dilate. They remind me of a person on drugs. She tells me she needs to pee and asks that I stop cuddling her. I raise my leg off her and, Grab onto her back as she gets up. This means absolutely nothing And yet, Life barely feels as real as her skin under my fingers. As she walks away, I wonder where the poetry will come from I wonder What is love, but a bank of poetry, shaped as a woman?