MayDay

The train leaves in ten. Are you sure you want to walk? The question repeated itself in my periphery. I had no doubts. In the street, a stumbling man needed help with a taxi; once sent on his way, the city was empty, quiet. I trundled along the water, dark deep water turning slowly into still blue seas. I wanted desperately to dive in. Do you remember last time I saw May arrive on these shores, I did, how cold it was, how much I wanted to soak in the last of the country before adventure caught me?

By the time I reached my south island, my new home, my small corner at the end of the stairs and the stone church looming with its sunrise rays around the corner, how awake my senses, how glad my steps. Cherry blossoms, birds a-singing, the sun rising in the distance, how close it was. The apartment smiled as I entered; such new aquaintances and already such good friends.

My father lies dying, he whispered, and no one cares. But the truth is not always what we perceive, the party not always what we expected. For a short, silent moment, Stockholm was mine. My heart bleeds infinitely; morning trickles in through the blinds. May is here. We will all be saved, in the end.

Sofia

I dropped the keys in the mail slot; in half a second, a rattle, the apartment was gone. I lie in a new bed now. The subway underneath has gone quiet, the floor doesn't shake as it did. There is a church outside my window, its bells ring, every hour, on the hour, great big giant bells tolling down the street. May runs through my dusty corridors, rattles every bone, stirs pages long sleeping and writes stories anew.

The window open, I sleep sounder than I have in ages.

the Old Apartment

This is the last time I'll walk this way to my sister's. This is the last time I'll trundle this hill on a Saturday night. This is the last time I'll have breakfast on this balcony (it's the first time, too, so I may not remember to miss it). This is the last time I'll close my eyes and sleep to the rocking of the subway trains below. 

Spring exploded in the city today, in an hour the trees had popped, the flowers washed the lawns in color, the birds busied themselves with six months worth of gossip. May lies on the tip of our tongues, restless May, May that tickles my every nerve and I want to go. There is never a better time to move than May.

(You should know.
You have done it enough.)

Always that restless inability to sleep, the night before. Always that excitement, and apprehension, and stir of emotions. Tomorrow I drop off one key, I pick up another. Another home. Another life.

A clean slate.
A white, blank page.
May,
and a whole new world
for the taking.

of First Positions

and it occurs to me
that this is *exactly* what life is like.

Katarina

(There was a post here
about spring
and the flowering cemetery
and the loveliness of it all, 

but none of the words came out right
and if it takes too much work to write,
I figure they weren't good to begin with
so I scratched them
and moved on to do something else.  

There's a metaphor for life 
and how one chooses to live it
in there
but I will feign blindness to it.)


"It could be worse," she said,
"The ship could have sunk and
we could all be treading water."

Ours

It's here. It's here. It's here. 

Early morning wakes me, sunlight sifting through every weary crack in the foundation, birdsong streaming through the speakers, that certain scent in the air and you know, you know, it's here.

The music in my ears couldn't be loud enough, my steps couldn't be quick enough, enough air could not fill my lungs, I was insatiable, I danced down the street, no matter the obstacles, the tasks at hand, I am invincible.

Another winter has passed; it dug its claws deep into my soul and dragged whatever Life was in there through gutters and drains until there was not a shred of light left, but it has passed. I may lie panting on the curbside, but I breathe. I forget, how easily I forget, every winter that this is what it does.

And yet, how easily I remember what lies waiting on the other side. My insides bubble, laughter bursts through every hollow cell in my veins, evaporates into the late twilight, my mind races in the night, unable to sleep, unwilling. What is sleep, when there has been nothing but, for months.

Now is the time for living.

In The Country

The bus took such winding turns, our Saturday morning bodies queasy on unknown roads. It dropped us at a quiet intersection in an unassuming village: church, grocery store, coffeeshop, quiet. Another bus through sleeping countrysides, a waiting car, and we landed at the house at the top of the hill, with nothing but wide open space ahead.

The sea is beautiful this time of year, all grey and moody and inviting. At every turn in the weather, every glimpse of sunlight, it twinkles in gold and reminds you of warm summer afternoons and unending nights, of green, green leaves just aching to burst into being, of that special softness the air has when you bike ever so quickly through it on your way home at dawn. It makes you young, again.

Wine bottles emptied, one by one they lined the kitchen counter as conversation drifted through the usual stages of indecency and liberated laughter. I went outside for a smoke, sat in the dark silence and watched the embers glow, listened to returned birds tell their stories of travel and brighter futures. Spring is so close I can taste it. I forgot, again I forgot, how naively I abandoned the knowledge that this is the changing of seasons: that winter kills every last breath in you, it tears apart your defenses and extinguishes your sparks, and that spring always returns to remind you of who it is you are.

I can feel it, stirring my insides, waking my heart strings. Any day now, the long dark winter will be over, and I will forget there was ever night. Any day now, I will be alive.