j’ai espère que
je pouvais penser
en français
i’m fairly certain that is incorrect
damn close to gibberish
but the sentiment still stands
i wish i wish i wish
i could think
in french
maybe i could understand and speak it better
then
[was french the language my Mom studied in school?]
[could we have practiced together
if life didn’t suck so hard
in 2001?]
i understood very little Greek
in Greece
and a fair amount of French
in France
but the Spanish sounds so fast
in Spain
and Portuguese, to my ears, is nearly Russian
in Portugal
i keep just wanting to speak in French
because it’s the only language i’ve been able to even start to grasp
but most folks here understand English fine
[i just don’t actually want to be associated
with that damn country
of mine]
having a whole conversation
in french
some words rushing past
in a jumble
but also able to pick up certain specifics here and there
and
able to reply
in french
apparently that’s what i wanted
from this trip
[even more so than a life-changing croissant]
once again
en train de voyager
this time
ce temps
en avion
pas de ferrie
[i’m guessing at some of this french
but so far, i think i’m doing ok]
[though i keep worrying that i’m teaching kip things wrong
and the francophones on this plane
are judging me]
the two kips
unfocused
in two different ways
someone help someone write something
(sometimes you just need to fumble over words
at each other
making the other person laugh
before you come up with the
perfect plan
and go back to writing
immédiatement)
as i do more things
i feel like my mainstays
stay in the background
(so far back
that i forget if i did them
or not)
but they are habits/rituals/consistencies
for a reason
(and it is not the worst thing
in the world
to miss a day
or two)
so
stop
worrying
about it,
and stop
worrying
like there’ll be punishment
if some other thing takes a day
away
just because
physical exercise
has been added
and social classes
have continued
doesn’t mean
the morning poems will cease
or the language learning
will falter
there used to be
dozens
of things
in your day,
you enjoyed
filling
the day-lit hours…
don’t force it,
just
remember.
a kip home
a home for kips
the kippiest house to ever house a kip
but where/what/how is it?
~~~
do i feel better
(je me sens plus bien)
when i write in french
(quand j’écris en français)
because i don’t have to think as deeply?
(parce que je ne dois pas penser que profondément?)
–> est-ce que je me sens mieux quand j’écris en français parce que je n’ai pas à réfléchir aussi profondément?
~~~
someday
(maybe someday soon?)
i’ll get to create
the secret garden
of my dreams
concentrate first on what you’re writing
don’t think about how to perform it
nor what people are going to think of it
nor what people will say to you
sunday will arrive far sooner than you expect,
why make it arrive earlier
by anticipating everything that will happen?
(maybe that’s just how my brain works?)
(but it seems very, very unhelpful)
~~~
i don’t know why
french café music
calms me so
but it sure does
so here it plays
morning after morning
picking up a few more words every dawn
surprising myself by how much i understand
hoping one day to catch it all.
~~~
am i ever going to attack
full, epic, long-form, big damn poetry
again?
(i suppose i just did,
what with the monologue assignment
i just wrote slam poetry for,
and i suppose i shouldn’t
count out
the big poems
sitting in this giant document
just waiting for revisions
and posting)
but it confuses me,
this ebb and flow of poetry
of how some days words slip and flow
and some days i must pull and pull and pull
and what that all means for myself
and me
and my creativity…
language(s),
culture(s),
french has my heart
(le français a mon cœur)
but spanish…
spanish would be smarter
spanish would be more useable
(spanish isn’t really that far from the other languages i’ve studied
so it’s not completely foreign,
though i do find myself speaking it like french,
pronouncing (or not pronouncing) half the words
nasally
throatily)
but why is this another case of
all or nothing
black or white
why do i feel like i have to get
completely
fully
100% fluent
in french
before i can even start to study another language?
(i’ve already traveled to spanish-speaking countries,
even after a few months of [re]studying the language,
and still spent most of my time caught with one word
in a fully thought out spanish sentence
stuck in french.
what is extra study in french
really
going to do?)
(other than getting me stuck
more?
)
kipventures 