travel

July 12, 2025 [part 2]

/ HJ / Leave a comment

while we didn’t fall in love with Lisbon
like we thought we might

we definitely fell in love with Europe
and the fact that people here
seem to be a little bit more functional/
the democracies around here
definitely are more functional
than the shitshow we left
and are now approaching back

and Paris
the surprise contender
from least likely
to most
in our future endeavors

[is it just that we fall in love with
anything
that reminds us of New York?]

[is that the moral of this whole experience?]

July 11, 2025 [part 2]

/ HJ / Leave a comment

i can see why
people love this tree
and personify [her] to the point of
pronouns

she is something truly
living
and being,
imposing
and consoling

there is something
here
underneath her
in her shade
in her presence
that i find
indescribable
but inscrutably
here

i breathe her in
and hope she knows
all the love i bring
with me
here
to her

July 11, 2025

/ HJ / Leave a comment

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]

July 9, 2025

/ HJ / Leave a comment

a family
a train ride
and thousands of sunflowers
in fields rolling past
at 266 km/h

and somehow it all reminds me of
van Gogh’s paintings
and how much i want to become
an impressionist

~~~

i just got so confused
as to why the baby in front of me
wasn’t crying in response to the
baby crying in the next train car over

and then i remembered that babies are not dogs
who bark and howl to be heard by others
of their species…

~~~

this whole trip
is a whirlwind

this whole life
kind of is
too

at least i have a train car
inside which to sit and write
all my silly poems

~~~

every
single
time
another train passes directly by
i
am
startled

~~~

there are
so many more palm trees
than i ever would have expected
in Europe

[i think that’s on me tho,
because climate is a known thing]

~~~

i think
if you’ve seen
any
van Gogh painting
of nature
or landscape

you’ve seen the full spirit of
what these trains speed past

July 8, 2025 [part 2]

/ HJ / Leave a comment

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]

July 8, 2025

/ HJ / Leave a comment

who would have guessed
the Eiffel Tower lit up
in magical sparkles
at 10:00pm
[22:00]
?

[probably all those tourists we were walking towards,
but it was a complete surprise for us, as was
the time of the evening]

[still, très magique]