lecture

White sterility against empty black matt seats. The hall is a sixth full. Tufts of white hair like tamed dandelions. I am separated by a barrier from the man talking about how to make poetry come alive.

The guy beside me has his Chrome browser on a Gabrielle Aplin song. I smile. I scribble excitedly on my hand: I love Aplin. He smiles, leans towards me. "I just found out about her, like, on Monday," he whispers.

I reach for his keyboard; he motions my hand away and passes me his phone instead. I do a Youtube search for my favourite song: gabrielle aplin evaporate acoustic. Hand it back to him. The man is still talking.