hello, i'm london

Twice this year I've seen trees go amber and naked, (you can see the real shape of them) looking perfect and perfectly dead in the sky. I was promised that things are going to sprout again. (Looking at nothing in particular, constantly, eyes glazing over.) When they were dying in Athens I practiced my eyeliner, winged, thought about becoming pale and slim, deserving of takeaway coffees and cigarettes, thinking 'if I had cigarettes I wouldn't feel this hungry'. Aware of new followers, eyes on the street and in the office, up and down, up and down again. Everything is tenderly connected in a schoolyard secret sort of way: opening a book to find pages about the namesake of my new suburb, parallel initials, the same size jumpers, flannelette, socks to bed. I can navigate this, my dear. But if I die on the tube because of a terrorist it will be okay, I will smile, my ears filled with sound.