Half banana. Wet banana. Make-me-do-a-double-take banana. Two thousand steps into my journey and, for a moment, I forget the rain licking the back of my neck. How long have you been there, banana? Laying on the sidewalk like a make-shift mile marker between where I’ve been and where I’m going. I’ve always had a soft spot for environmental storytelling: a torn photograph, flowers in the trash, the ghost of a bonfire leaving soot on my shoes. New banana, sweet banana, discarded-on-the-street banana. Which unlucky son of a gun left you there? I imagine scurvy creeping up on the horizon of whoever that person is… or at least an unbalanced meal. Will they remember that they forgot you? Or did you never matter in the first place? Small banana, round banana, rotting-on-the-ground banana. Does the pitter-patter of this rain remind you of home? Does it spark that longing inside to return to a place you have never been? Were you grown in the shadow of a painting of a place that you were meant to belong? Oh, banana… I must ask: do you feel abandoned by us all? Lone banana. Sad banana. I-think-you’re-just-like-me banana. Do the banana gods care that you never had a place or purpose of your own? When the bugs consume your flesh will you finally feel at home? If bananas have an afterlife, I hope yours is kind. Half banana, wet banana… rain soaked and left behind.