{"id":17783,"date":"2022-03-24T14:10:44","date_gmt":"2022-03-24T13:10:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/stadtsprachen.de\/de\/?post_type=stsp_text&p=17783"},"modified":"2022-03-24T16:33:59","modified_gmt":"2022-03-24T15:33:59","slug":"bad-traveler","status":"publish","type":"stsp_text","link":"https:\/\/stadtsprachen.de\/de\/text\/bad-traveler\/","title":{"rendered":"Bad Traveler"},"content":{"rendered":"

SOMEONE ELSE<\/strong><\/p>\n

Snow covered trucks
\nmake their way into the night
\nwith sleepy drivers and sharp colors:
\na vision that sticks in the brain
\nwhile the eye\u2019s memory flashes
\ninto the thick black landscape
\nmy dream of a journey.
\nI miss that borrowed language
\nand the girl who had
\nthree houses in six months,
\na messy love life
\nand second-hand dresses
\nfor less than five bucks.
\nShe would always go
\nfor the heart of it.
\nI miss her but not as if
\nI wanted to be her again,
\nmore like an old friend
\nwho knows me too well.
\nI love her as if I loved
\nsomeone else entirely.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

IDLE<\/strong><\/p>\n

I set off to see the World
\nand now my world has shrunk
\nto a handful of friends and lovers,
\nidle geniuses bumming around the house,
\nmaking no contribution to my desire
\nof having a significant experience.
\nI said it as a joke once: home
\nis where ambition comes to die.
\nBut such an ending is perhaps a relief
\nto the young tired souls
\nthat have postponed love for careers
\nand families for one
\nbedroom apartments as close
\nas possible to Downtown.
\nThe city shivers through them,
\na soft body waking up to its sadness
\non the cold wet grass of the park
\nthe morning after a ball.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

COURTIERS<\/strong><\/p>\n

We arranged flowers all day
\nfor a part-time job west of the island.
\nWe meet at the station so early
\nwe\u2019re surprised the city\u2019s alive.
\nWe \u0301re not the men and women
\nfalling asleep on the buses,
\nthe working people of Montreal
\nwhom we rarely ever see,
\nWe the young night owls
\nstill awake long after midnight
\ncoming up with games
\nand complicated affairs
\nto pass the time,
\nlike courtiers in our little
\nbohemian apartments.
\nThis is another adventure
\nto us, an Experience.
\nWe ride the metro at 6 am
\nas if we had a secret mission,
\nlike kids on the cold exciting
\nmorning of a camping trip.
\nWe work in silence
\nwhile the radio speaks
\nof the rain outside,
\nwe touch when you walk by
\ncarrying buckets of roses,<\/p>\n

we kiss during lunch break.
\nI look at you while I try
\nto figure out simple things
\nlike how to wrap an elastic
\naround a bouquet for mother\u2019s day:
\nwhite and purple fujis
\nlillies, carnations, daisies
\nand the ones we call alstros,
\na strange flower I\u2019d never seen before.
\nWe meet by the coffee machine
\nand dance a bit after finishing up:
\nit\u2019s time to go home.
\nOnly now that means
\ntwo different addresses
\nand the sadness of a paradise
\nlost when our court
\nfinally fell apart.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

BEGINNERS<\/strong><\/p>\n

No longer under the spell
\nof first times and foreign languages,
\nI wish again for the eyes
\nof the grateful traveler:
\nnot a tourist but someone
\nwho touches things beyond
\ntheir deceiving surface.
\nI walk home from the metro
\nunder blue and orange lights
\nand often wonder why
\nI love you if you no longer
\nmake me laugh.
\nBut once my heart flickered
\nred and sweet over the snow,
\nchildish in the way old people are,
\ntrading their chance at wisdom
\nfor another first ride.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

SKYLAND<\/strong><\/p>\n

Late at night, only the camp
\nkeeper\u2019s light is still on
\nbut his kids play in the dark.
\nThey walk with me to the trailer
\nwhere their mother kindly
\nlends me a can-opener
\nand sends them off to bed.
\nI\u2019m the helper, says the older girl,
\ntanned legs and blond piggy tails,
\nwhile her younger sister
\ndraws circles around us
\nwith her bike and I imagine
\nhow peaceful their minds must be,
\nsoft like ancient rocks
\nwashed by the lake and golden
\ntheir lives of adventure
\nand night skies, boredom
\nnot yet invented.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

LOVE POEM<\/strong><\/p>\n

This is a love poem for Carolyn.
\nShe has beautiful curly hair
\nlike the girl in the movie Brave.
\nHer brain lights up
\nas if it was made
\nof transparent plastic
\nand we could see all the parts:
\nthe ones that try to make things work
\nand the others.
\nThose are called feelings.
\nI get them all the time but
\nthat doesn\u2019t make me special.
\nThe subtle generosity of her pain
\ncame to us in the shape of plans:
\nShe couldn\u2019t offer the present
\nbecause the present was always shifting
\ndespite our biggest efforts
\nand there was no one
\nand everyone
\nto blame for that.
\nCarolyn\u2019s poem would be better than mine.
\nShe dances in the living room
\nto the music she has chosen.
\nShe\u2019s trying to move on,
\nshe probably succeeded already.
\nThis is a love poem<\/p>\n

for a former roommate
\nI met through an online add
\nThe photos were terrible
\nbut the title said community.
\nShe wrote that word and she
\nwas the first to reply,
\nsaid she liked the fact
\nthat I mentioned a road-trip.
\nI wanted to meet her, I told my friends
\nhow cool this Canadian girl was.
\nNow we don\u2019t look at each other
\nand she was there for my birthday
\nbut didn\u2019t say happy birthday.
\nNot even hello, really.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

FALLS<\/strong><\/p>\n

As we look for a parking lot
\nunder the staggering sun
\nof Niagara Falls
\nI tell you: in a way this is
\nthe perfect place for breaking up.
\nIt should be fun and beautiful
\nbut it\u2019s overall just sad and tacky,
\nmuch like every relationship
\ntowards the end.
\nWe\u2019re no different
\nfrom all the other tourists
\nwith their pink rain ponchos
\nstanding on the boat.
\nFlamingos over the blue water.
\nThe woman next to us
\nstruggles with the camera
\ninstead of relishing the waterfall.
\nShe misses the moment
\nbecause she can\u2019t figure out
\nthe mechanism meant
\nto capture that moment.
\n\u00a1Smile!
\nYou are still the eyes
\nbehind my camera
\non every photo.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

BLUE HALLWAYS<\/strong><\/p>\n

Flight attendants glimmer in the night
\nas I pray for us to stay suspended,
\nhalf asleep in the minimal light,
\nblue hallways to the bathroom,
\nand no one outside we can talk to,
\nalone for eternity: the dance
\nof the brain on airplane mode<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

SOMEONE ELSE Snow covered trucks make their way into the night with sleepy drivers and sharp colors: a vision that sticks in the brain while the eye\u2019s memory flashes into the thick black landscape my dream of a journey. 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