Sometimes, just after the rain,

you remember how often you 
misunderstand important things—
like that time the drunken 

drain cleaner looked 
straight at you and said, 
Of course, I read poetry,

or the night you saw the shopkeeper
you’d argued with days before,
wearing no mask and laughing,

and how at that moment, 
he looked just like your closest friend—
or yesterday, when you heard 

the young fruit seller on your corner
tell the woman next to you,
yes, he was looking for books—

ninth standard, and schools 
have been closed for so long—
and you suddenly remembered 

the relationship between 
the price of labour and rice and pears—
and the cost of capitalism.