New Orleans
After night fell, the smell of rose water. Of old perfume. Mixing with smoke and Bourbon. Young men with southern accents dressing like old men, ordering milk and cookies. And old men carrying tubas in the street as if it were the most natural thing in the world. They say, "Hey baby" and smile. Women with hips and boyish-figured feminine women in men's clothing.
An old cafe wrapping around a street corner. Like Paris only blacker. Warmer. Playing tinny, hissing jazz through a saturated walnut and brass radio with a ghostly kind of comfort. Exposed brick and chairs that say, "Have a seat." Hats. Pinstripes. Shoes. Strange pastries and candy in large glass containers.
Architecture whose walls are wrapped in the sultry embrace of potent flowers and ulterior-motived vines. Tall thin windows that look like doors and doors that open up to interiors rich with color, with furniture you can actually rest in. Streets you can taste.
All this age. As if time hasn't stopped, but has just settled in and keeps breathing. Maybe time just slowed here. As if it thought to itself, "This is nice. I think I'll stay awhile. Make every moment stretch into eternity because I can't stand the thought of this ending."
Oh the city wasn't all like that. There were also sun-stained neighborhoods with friendly callers from the stoop. There was the stench of under the bridge. The tourists and the beads. The post-punk hostel where no one was really all that friendly but at least there were good tunes nostalgic for the '90s.
I'm having anxiety dreams lately. Every night. Dreaming of things I shouldn't and don't want to dream of. Dreaming of never finding what I'm looking for or objects that change shape. My bicycle is stolen, found, then morphs into a bicycle not my own. Dreams of produce aisles missing ingredients for a cooking competition.
It's strange having these interludes of subconscious turmoil when before sleep, and after I wake, I am greeted by feline purrs and a vulnerable human form. Beautiful to see that face as the first striking image of my day. Enough to take the world's weight off my shoulders.
So it goes. The push and pull of it all.
An old cafe wrapping around a street corner. Like Paris only blacker. Warmer. Playing tinny, hissing jazz through a saturated walnut and brass radio with a ghostly kind of comfort. Exposed brick and chairs that say, "Have a seat." Hats. Pinstripes. Shoes. Strange pastries and candy in large glass containers.
Architecture whose walls are wrapped in the sultry embrace of potent flowers and ulterior-motived vines. Tall thin windows that look like doors and doors that open up to interiors rich with color, with furniture you can actually rest in. Streets you can taste.
All this age. As if time hasn't stopped, but has just settled in and keeps breathing. Maybe time just slowed here. As if it thought to itself, "This is nice. I think I'll stay awhile. Make every moment stretch into eternity because I can't stand the thought of this ending."
Oh the city wasn't all like that. There were also sun-stained neighborhoods with friendly callers from the stoop. There was the stench of under the bridge. The tourists and the beads. The post-punk hostel where no one was really all that friendly but at least there were good tunes nostalgic for the '90s.
I'm having anxiety dreams lately. Every night. Dreaming of things I shouldn't and don't want to dream of. Dreaming of never finding what I'm looking for or objects that change shape. My bicycle is stolen, found, then morphs into a bicycle not my own. Dreams of produce aisles missing ingredients for a cooking competition.
It's strange having these interludes of subconscious turmoil when before sleep, and after I wake, I am greeted by feline purrs and a vulnerable human form. Beautiful to see that face as the first striking image of my day. Enough to take the world's weight off my shoulders.
So it goes. The push and pull of it all.