Depressed? Good, you should be. Don’t stroll confidently down the boulevard, skulk hunch-backed through the alleys. You don’t see the facades, only the flip sides. You don’t hear the singles, only the B-sides.

Skirt the backways, backstage, sidestepping toppled trash bins and dog-doo. Kick a can over pockmarked pavement. Broken bottles and bluebottles. A sodden pile of Yesterday’s News, half a pair of shoes.

Even the totter-parked alley cars are nicer than yours. Tiptoe to ogle backlit windows. Everyone’s TV pulsing at the same rate. Peeping Tom at normal people’s evenings. Alleys reek of rot- did everyone toss out a dead fish today? Dodge puddles of dumpster-juice.

When you’re sad, you criss-cross the cross-streets, dirtdwelling on the wrong side of the tracks. Little one-way mazes for you to pinball around in. No street signs, no shop windows, no front doors for you. You’re a pitiable sight, out-of-sight, rolling your little leper-cart, an outcast of contentment. Peace is padlocked to you. Gaze instead on your dominion of holey mattresses and flattened boxes. Your only communiqués No Trespassing and pathetic lost pet posters.

“They’ll never find it.”

You’re at an impasse, a fine mess. Don’t cross over to the sunny side of the street, keep skittering and knuckle-dragging in the shadows.

You build your own town in your noggin. What’s it gonna be, sun-dappled cobblestones and droll cafes? A bustling metro? A quaint backwards fishing village? When you’re sad, all roads lead inward, nowhere. Cement blocks trimmed with concertina wire, piled high enough to blot out the stars. You belong here on your own backstreets, no doubt. No Outlet.