Have you been to Paris?

Cheers,

Life is ok, despite everything. You are not here, but it’s OK, despite everything. Things will be different soon - we will be drinking Guinness and Gin and tonic and it will be like time has not passed at all. We will be in London, we will be in Malmö and we will inhibit the world. We will have date night and we will learn as we lean into it, as we go, because we never knew how to do it before. We will play it by ear, because in the end that is what this life is all about – adapting to notes and a melody that you are not used to.

I’ve got a new dress for the occasion – it’s blue and I know you will like it.

This life. Munich, Shenzhen, HongKong, London, Paris – all encapsulated by emotions, huddled up in colours. How can I combine all these emotions in one go? How can I show all this love?

I guess there will always be Paris. There will always be that woman in black with the silver cigarette holder. There will always be you and me, but this time we will be on point...

Strawberry Gin

You shield your eyes, your breath is compromised, strained, too fast; this is the time of Corona. Like thoughts in my mind, your breath is here but not, so we both keep chasing on and I wake every morning, in this crowded room with too many things that are not mine and I smell my impertinence in the air as I throw the sheets away from my pale, naked frame.

I want to walk with you, wordlessly through winding streets, through all the years of words not spoken, leaving us free of a past that has chained us down for too long.  

In my mind there has always been a desk near a window where I look out and see a moor explode in a cascade of colours. I watch you moving across the wild, while I put my pen to paper; your breath alive (unlike now) and we are far away from this city, far away from these days of strawberry gin and basic survival.

These are the days of Corona and I keep silent, but my heart still beats next to yours…

Lilac Street

Down by the canal; I feel you through the pavement, through the asphalt. I pass by shops and vendors, people shuffling on down the sidewalk - the early spring light embracing London. These memories were never ours, yet you are here, always here, walking next to me - even though the only sound I hear is the echo of my own footsteps. I walk on; floating images surprising me with their crispness, their sharpness and focus, but they all have fuzzy edges - like polaroids taken in a distant past. It's a strange equation; I lived through it all alone and you were never here, yet you never really left me.

I get mystified by how this city screams your name.

Bonnie and Clyde

Your eyes meet mine over that first drink since forever and I know you are thinking the same thing I am. How the hell did we get here – are we moving backwards? X marks the spot where we fell apart and even though we never had a shotgun shot in the dark I still wear your words like tattoos. You reach across the table for my hand just like always.

“I have the getaway car – are you brave enough?”, you say as you finish your drink in one swig, then you are on your feet and my mind is a mess (as always around you).

I think about the fact that only the young can run. I think about the fact that all is relative and then I follow you out into the night towards a different life in-between maybes.  

Just down the road

Some days, some hours, minutes and seconds away I know another reality is hiding. The pathway is only visible at twilight; exploding and imploding in silver light pouring out of the sky. The harsh lines of the cubicles surrounding me are blurring - the shadows are getting longer and longer until they seem to reach the sky, all the while the silver of the dusk overpowers London, leaving me spellbound, enclosed by the delicate beauty of life.

Walking the Walk

Alleys of grey slab and concrete surround our street just like they do all other pathways in this merciless and majestic city. The difference is that their curves remain soft and tranquil as they seem to caress the bend ahead. I will take our street with me, but the rest I give away to the lowest bidder. The hard-lined skyscrapers and cubes you call houses, the busy road where cars pass endlessly towards somewhere, anywhere but here. Empty eyes and hungry bellies in lonely alleyways, hollow faces in doorways staring back at me as I walk on towards something luckier. It is an evening that manages to be deadly silent, but still so loud I can hardly breathe – the knot in my chest increasing with every sound until it consumes me. I gasp in the cold winter air of a new year, the blood pumping, my heart beating hard against my ribcage. The door to the world just closed and I can feel it in every cell, in every strand of strawberry blonde hair – the knowledge of something lost radiates through the very core of who I am. 

Change is approaching fast now, and it is welcomed. I know it will have a salty twang, but life is never one dimensional so a bit of sweet and sour will be thrown in as well. Regardless, I will remain upright. I am ready. You are not here, but still guiding my path towards where I should have been (stayed?) all along. This road, these cubes, this city of concrete and steel will be what my nightmares are made of for a while but that’s OK, I don’t sleep much these days.

I’ll take our street with me into a different future though. See you down there in my dreams if nowhere else.

I am ready.

Heart in Hand

There is a hole in my chest were my heart used to be. You took it with you when you left and I was never brave enough to ask for it back. Things are different now - roles reversed as the cold wind blows us towards something new and improved. Strangely enough you are wearing a hat. It is pulled down firmly which means I can't see your eyes. It doesn't really matter though; I know them by heart just as I do every delicate detail of you. As usual I feel like I am cheating death when you reach for my hand across the table. As usual I feel like there is nowhere to be but here when you lift your tired gaze and meet my eyes for the first time tonight. Your face is pale and hollow and there is a silent desperation in every breath.

Then you smile your childlike smile and I decide in an instant that I want you to hold on to my heart for just a little while longer.  

While I was dreaming

Off the Map

The streets are sleek with rain; the grey surface reflecting the streetlights as I drive on endlessly over viaducts and through tunnels – towards where my heart has been kept for a very long time, via the arteries and veins of my expansive city. The contradictory nature of this place – so incredibly heartless but also loving, so callous and cruel, yet still warm and embracing.

I am wide awake as I move into the right lane. My turn is coming up now. I have always wondered if will look back once my decision has been made and I guess I will know soon enough. It is for certain that my world is less empty since you came along and I am petrified to go back to how it was before there was you. I no longer do black or white, only shades - yours is darker than mine but with more sparkle. If we merge will the shade mirror the rain-drenched streets I am driving on?

As I take my turn (without looking back) I can feel myself start to smile.

Ironic, iconic

In between days I step away from you; finding my escape in chords, in the notes flowing endlessly from my speaker. Change is sure to follow and I am calmer these days, but if this is maturity I ask it to kindly fuck off!

A new chapter, but bringing me right back to where I started. I am not the same, not anymore; I have been reshaped and remoulded riding uncontrollable waves, always chasing new and illusive moments - I am not sure you will like me now and I do care, but very little. I close my eyes, but I still feel wide awake, like my nerves are too close to the surface. There is not a single day when I don’t think about our drive through the city - you always did hit me straight between the eyes, like a ton of bricks. Who needs new love when your heart is perpetually closed?

I am here whenever you want to ride the waves with me…