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INCOGNITO
Cities allow an anonymitythat few who have itclaim to want,and those who cannotfind it only wishto briefly have it.Cities have mastered juxtaposition,offering what is unwanted,taking that which is.But we choose to livein cities, visit them,for they are our sirensand we are simple sailorsalways looking for home.
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WHO WILL VISIT
Who will visit this daythe inn that is your psyche, whowill extend their stay, whowill check out early perhaps,and who will arrive expectedor just hoping for a place to stayhowever briefly or long as you allow?As the proprietor you can turn away those you don’t wishto entertain even for a day, angerand his kin can…
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HOMEGROWN
He only wanted to know if there wereplaces I had always wantedto visit but never gone, and didI still plan on going there.I could have asked “why that question”but he was someone who never traveled,was born, bred and would likely diein this city, content that it hadeverything of value that the worldcould possibly offer such…
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VISITORS
As much as he needed sleephe had grown to dread itfor each night they visited him,always whispering, he strainingto hear if they had wisdom to offeror were simply there to mock,to plague him, as recompense for someimagined sin, some innocent mistakeor simply because eternity canfairly quickly become boring.He knows their number willonly grow over time…
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ISLANDS
I always loved visiting Japan,the Temples of Senso-ji, Todai-jiothers so small their names fadedas I walked away from them,for while I was gaijin, my zenmade them feel less alien.I enjoyed visits to Hawaii,the lushness of the landscape,the old whaling town, nowreduced to ash and ruin,the lava desert of the big island,the volcanoes, live and dormant.Everyone…
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MISSED MEETING
On Saturday it will be21 years since I missedthe last chance to meet my mother.If this seems strange to youimagine how it is for me, how itit is to have your mother dieat 82 and you now 70saying you never got to meet.You’ve guessed correctly that Iam an adoptee, but did you knowI waited so…
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MEMORY
She regularly visits the cemetery,sits for hours on the little folding stoolshe brings with her, at his gravesiteand reminisces with him over momentsof joy and sadness they had shared.Once a year she brings flowerswhich she leaves in the small pot.When she planted them in the soilbut would find them dead by her next visit.She wondered…
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A FAREWELL VISIT
My mother no longer visits mein my dreams, actuallyneither does for I’ve had two,the advantage or is itdisadvantage of the adoptee.None of my three fathersever paid a postmortem visit.It complicates things when allI know of my birth mother isfrom a college yearbook photo,but that is how she looked in thosefew visits after I discovered her.The…
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PRAGUE
When we walked the streetsof Prague, we felt at once alienbut surrounded by so many tourists,almost somewhat at home.Unlike in Lyon or Arles wheremy limited high school Frenchallowed me the most rudimentaryof conversations, in Pragueit was pointing or Google Translate,and then I wore the mark of touristdespite wearing clothes Ihad purchased there the day before.We…
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UNDER THE BED
There was a ghostor two for a short while,that lived under my bedwhen I was three or four. My mother said theywere not real, she couldn’tsee them when she looked,so they were all in my mind. I had to tell her that youdon’t ever actually see ghosts,you just know they are therebecause you sense their…
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an old writer and his words 