The Sun Child

I thought he was a ghost
with his skin like alabaster
and his hair like corn silk.
He stood in the cold,
outside my door,
when it was still dark,
to remind me of the morning.
"Hello," he said.
And I said it back, for
it was all I knew how to give.
He watched me
while we cut the bread
and drank the coffee with it.
What great, big eyes,
so brilliantly violet, so clear,
as only such a child's eyes can be.
He was as white as snow,
Madame's little Sun Child.

What is Pink?

There is pink, and then there is Pink.

Pink is the color of the wind when the sun sets on the French Riviera and the sky blushes softly at first, and then furiously. You have never seen Pink like this. Not when the all the world is drenched in its light, and the buildings bathe in it.

You cannot know this kind of Pink without having climbed to the Chateau de Nice first, to watch the sky burn. The cool evening air will soon dry the perspiration on your brow, and you will catch your breath after only a little while. No doubt Pink exists in many other forms, but I am not speaking of those pinks. I speak of this one, the Pink of the Bournes', that soft camellia flush.

There is a bottle of rosé in the fridge That, too, is Pink.

My Chucks

 ...climb enough staircases

to reach Heaven

and return with with a snow globe.

...step gingerly around puddles

only to sink unwittingly into mud.

The soil, you see, 

is soft and full of guile

in this part of France.

...collect lime dust,

as their owner 

counts the spirals 

in Jesus' robe.

...are removed with relief

Yonne

"I'll bet you've never seen a French hamlet before," our professor said. There was a rousing chorus of assent as we filed off the bus. My father came from a small village in China that I suppose could also be called a hamlet, but I'm not sure. It wasn't anything like what we saw as we stood in the gray light of Yonne, waiting for everyone to collect their bags from the underbelly of the bus.

Vezelay

After spending the day and most of the afternoon in Vezelay, we came here, to Yonne. What remains of the day is cold, overcast, and gloomy. A little while ago, perhaps at 18:30, it began to drizzle. It's still drizzling without any sign of increasing or decreasing in intensity. It's an earnest, steady addition to our day.

I cannot speak, as I've lost my voice sometime in the night. It's a good excuse. I don't want to talk much, and not having a voice is a very good excuse. When you can't speak above a rasp, no one tries very hard to engage you in conversation.

Yonne is a very small place. Boring, maybe. But it's beautiful. There are apple trees belonging to the street they grow beside. They are far from the orchards and so some of us leaned over the hollows and plucked a few choice fruits. The fields are green-velvety- or brown-freshly tilled. Yesterday was warm, when we were in Dijon, and earlier today in Vezelay, but now it's anything but. It's an exercise in getting acquainted with a dreary kind of beautiful.

I walked very slowly along the dirt roads, smiling to acknowledge my friends as they skipped gaily by. I would that I were alone in this place. It's peaceful, but not the kind that comes from roaring waves- the peace that I know. The silence is profoundly startling. And it magnifies whatever sound erupts from whatever source.

I think this is a nice place to be tired in. The idea of an idyllic farm life is inviting. I do not think that I need to tell you that this is a dream of Yonne that we see. I cannot know what such an existence is really like, and all I've got, really, is generalization and fantasy. Perhaps I'd hate it here. Perhaps what seems peaceful now will grow monotonous, for I think I need the roar of waves. Perhaps the dogs that come barking to greet us will grow less charming in time.

But it seems unlikely. And for now, the dream tastes real and I will leave and remember the lingering sweetness.

 

 

Dijon Stone

What is dirty here

is soiled from passing years.

And what is water-stained

has withstood tears.

What is whole 

fears

what is broken

and crumbling

and grand.

The stones of Dijon house 

what bleeds prayer.

Lindau By Night

One thinks Heidelberg by day-with its surroundings-is the last possibility of the beautiful; but when he sees Heidelberg by night, a fallen Milky way, with that glittering railway constellation pinned to the border, he requires time to consider upon the verdict.

-Mark Twain, "A Tramp Abroad"

We came to Lindau off the vast expanse of water that touched the soil of four different countries. We came as tourists have always come, in droves, beneath the blaze of Summer sun. My first impression of Lindau was favorable, if lukewarm. It seemed a nice little city, situated on a nice little bit of rock, with some delightful winding roads and such.

We made our way on cobblestone roads, and peered into brightly decorated shop windows. I grew more fond of it the longer we walked. I was altogether charmed by the way the city looked in the afternoon light, the buildings all painted colors I’d never seen back home. Even on the shores of Del Mar the bungalows dim beneath the faded brilliance of the hues seen in Lindau.

There is a main street, and several little alleyways and quaint little detours that beckon with the alluring promise of getting you lost. Don’t be fooled; getting lost in a place like Lindau is a feat of superhuman proportions.

I remember the art museum. A humble collection, it displayed the works of Emil Nolde, a German expressionist painter. I hadn’t heard of him before, but liked his paintings immensely. I do love expressionism, and I was thinking of bold strokes and outlandish colors when I stepped back into the the sunny square.

If I liked Lindau in daylight, I liked it more the lower the sun sank in the sky, and I liked it still more when it left altogether. How the lights of the city sparkled on inky waves in the harbor, how the strains of street musicians drifted- I imagined- even to the great stone lion we had paid our respects to, when the day was still here. By day Lindau was very pretty and by night she was all grown up, with a diamond lariat at her throat and diamond bobs in her ears.

After a fashion we walked back into the heart of Lindau, knowing that the pretty stores were all closed. If you don’t know the feeling of buying ice cream from a store on wheels and eating it as you walk along darkened shop windows, then I pity you. You do not know Summer. We came upon a little cafe and we went in, for one of our party was very much drawn to that elusive pixie, wifi. So we followed the bars on our phones, and entered, casting sheepish smiles at the hostess, who knew we wouldn’t be buying anything. I remember that there was a man with a little french horn who got of his bicycle to play for us. Back home I don’t think it would have been the same, but here, under the cover of a thousand stars, charmed as we were by a little German island, we stood and smiled and swayed to his song.

“I’m hungry,” Hannah said. And when she said that, we felt its truth in our own bellies. It was such a wonderful thing, to be young and hungry in a city that was like a young lady who dances in a yellow silk dress with cobwebby lace, and rouges her cheeks, and scrubs it off again. It’s only like this at night; in the daytime, no one ever remember that they are young and immortal. Those are thoughts that come with the sinking of the sun. In the day, we think only of the tiredness in our legs, the heat even in the shade of the Rathaus. There is no room for divinity.