I eat a late and miserly dinner then go out to the porch for a cigarette the crickets are chirping winnowing away at the vast hum of the city dormant in the evening air blessedly cool after the heat wave and the 13000 lightning strikes which set the northern forests ablaze again for the sixth year in a row whether I have a pack of smokes on my person or not is a pretty accurate barometer by which to measure the internal pressure of my system it has been a wet July but now well into a drought yet within me the dew point only continues to climb I'm not sure what will happen to me next I hum with the anticipation of a satellite dish on a high rooftop as hot winds buffet from one direction and swirl up against the jarring iciness of winds from another an empty bus rolls past and just abreast of it a man on a small electric scooter drifting as if on a magic carpet his frenetic podcast whistling in clipped tones above the drone of the exhaust a plane reels amongst the stars and perhaps I can see a planet twinkling or perhaps it is just effervescing space trash

the dinner was miserly for I am poor a gas station ramen much improved by leftover tofu and scavenged cheese powder which I obtained on a recent visit to the northern forests the small oasis of a basecamp for expedition leaders I used to be one of them and was there to pick up a friend visiting from new york she also used to be one of them we felt old and queer amongst their unstaunchable optimism its familiarity and the familiarity of Dan who argues every year during all staff training with any queer person that they should not discuss their sexuality or gender with any students apparently to this day we wonder why he's still here and why that is the hill he wants to die on I can't even count the number of times a young person has confided in me their feelings on gender and sexuality like the sound of tall grasses swaying and bending as a timid animal scurries past all the trips were cancelled due to poor air quality which accounts for the surplus of food they call it roadkill and we hunkered in the cool rootbeer colored lake under the haze of smoke that burned in my eyes and nose and later watched the final world cup match which was anticlimactic and which did not offer messi any heroic chance to score on spain you could tell the new jersey stadium so badly wished they were a part of new york as they had banners that read new york new jersey outfitted for the occasion though any new yorker worth their salt would jeer at the depravity of that reach I jeered at the depravity of the camera operators intent on picking out each celebrity in the audience and zooming in to analyze each micro expression skulking across their ennui sticken faces but one amongst the cohort cheered loudly each time he was in possession of the ball

earlier today as I sat on the porch at midday before entering the black hole of despair which constitutes filling out any job application or sending any kind of email a van containing an entire six person family rolled past looped the block and came back to ask me did I know where they could find lactose free baby formula they had so many other resources and help but this one thing they could not find or where they could find it they could not afford it and I told them to check powwow grounds and ask and I would ask my neighbors and hoped that if we all held each other and whispered around our shared wisdom and care might emerge to carry this family and their hungry mewling youngest to better fortunes I might drive a bus someday soon for a job and I had better study up because it is certainly an occupation where I would meet so many people in need of some help maybe they can ride the bus for free if I'm lucky and don't have a transit cop on my route and I can say where to find food and clothing and toiletries and cigarettes and places to sleep and save part of my paycheck for people who need it more than I do and maybe some day this city will have a mayor that sees poor people as more than filth to bulldoze and sweep into the gutter and maybe someday it will just be free to ride the bus anyways or maybe someday we'll all be washing out down the storm drains together into the mississippi and carried somewhere else to settle in fertile silt