summer storms that washed through and left a night-long rainfall. lightning in the distance, i curl my knees up to my chin on the porch, the sounds of rain against metal, the smell of rain against tar and cement. inhaling the air, inhaling a kretek. eating indian food with carmelised rice, reading from a stack of old journals -- this entry from a trip to the sea. when the lightning begins to fade, the kids huddled on porches run to the street, drunk on the heat and electricity and petrichor. some urban rain dance.

i need to shower. the humidity coaxes sweat and scents from my skin. oily at the thin creases. my hair thick with heat and moisture, haven't shaved my legs in weeks. in the house, i am in my underwear, spooning sticky orange flesh out of half a cantaloupe, the juice making streams across my sternum. i am watching casablanca alone, scabs forming across the whimsical cuts on my wrists and forearms -- wounds from a feline. wounds from a feline.