Young Writers Society

rêvasser xxviii (au revoir et adieu)


I don’t like goodbyes.

I plan my trips in one-night stretches,
or two, or three,
because more than that and I get rest-
less. I do not know how to relax
when I am by myself.
There is only seeing all you can
and moving on to see more,
but that has a fatigue of its own
that dogs my steps like the drag
of too many bags against my shoulders
and the tender flesh of my neck.

And it works, for a time.
Move forward, see what’s coming
next. But as my plans unravel
I can’t see clearly past the train stations
stamped on my ticket;
one goodbye and one hello.
You play Das Lebewohl and
in the third movement, there is always
a Return.

The thing about French is
there’s a difference between
au revoir and adieu.
One means goodbye, until I see you
again. The other means
that the next time I see you
will be when we stand before
God. The other is akin to
never
to my mortal eyes.

I take photos of everything that matters,
and these I will see again;
these cities will never be lost
to my memory. But the feelings
will fade, and each small departure
reminds me of the greater loss.
I do not know which.
It is either the loss of my home,
of you,
or the future loss of everything
I have with me now
when I leave for good.

There’s nothing left to stay for
but I don’t want to leave:
because I do not know if this goodbye
will be an au revoir
or adieu.

rêvasser xxix (Marseille)


I like it hot
where the sun glints off the water,
brings blazing beams to rest
on bright white buildings;
where the harbor has hard edges
unsoftened by the sea
and graffiti sprawls from walls
to pavement to doors;
where eyes must stay sharp,
steer clear of quick-moving fingers,
because there are fortresses to
guard the port but not to protect
the citizens from themselves;
where the air rattles dry in your lungs
like a laugh and the only damp
is the sweat on your back,
is the dream of swimming
long and deep in the ocean;
where six people told me not to go,
but I flashed a brilliant, burning smile
and went anyway.

rêvasser xxx (Fini?)


And I think to myself:
at last, I have done it.

I have seen all the things I dreamed of,
have collected experiences like postcards
stamped with quirky conversations;
I have watched myself change with the landscape,
from grassy cliffs to forests to arid hills,
following the rivers wearing curves into
my body.

So I think that tonight,
finally, I will sleep.

But the keening of train whistles
echoes through the walls of my dreams,
relentless, insistent, pushing me until
I sleepwalk to the station, breath synchronizing
with the shush and rattle of wheels on tracks,
every step either onto or off of a platform.

I am not done yet.