Rainy night empty hand

Heavy breathing underneath a zipped up anorak

it is raining and I am on my favourite street.

You are a different person on the way home.

An entirely different human. The people you passed

on your way there are diffferent people now, too.

Empty hands. Different heads.

A song is different when the person who sung it

has died. You should always watch films twice

once when you're younger than the main characters

and then again when you're older

but that's not really watching the same film twice

it's watching two completely different films.

This is the first time I've listened to my favourite song

wearing these new clothes

sitting in this new flat.

The first time this has been my favourite song

since the reason it would inevitably become

my favourite song.