"Le Monde est une Poesie": Paris, At Last!
Sunset over Place de la Bastille |
“Le
Monde est une Poesie”
-- Yaseen Khan, Paris, Isle-de-France
Paris
for the first time was poetry.
I’ve been
trying to get to the City of Light since I was 21, my head full of textbook French
and Je m’appelle’s and Je voudrais’.
More than twice that age now, and celebrating a big birthday ending in a
“0,” I set out for Paris with my mouth wide open.
Yaseen Khan with me & Sandi |
“You know what it means,” he said, pointing, “in your heart.” On the fence near Khan’s work in big letters: “Le Monde est une Poesie” – The world is poetry. I bought a painting for Greg with a bit of verse by the Portuguese writer Fernando Pessoa: “Je t’aime comme L'Amour aimer” - I love you like Love loves.”
Then
Khan asked me to write him a poem. And I did, on the spot.
My
stay à Paris was rushing and brief—the days full of walking and walking and lovely,
unexpected sun—but I tried to put as much of it in my mouth as possible.
These small poems formed on my tongue as I tasted the City of Light.
you
eat cake
because
it’s beautiful
and
pink
and charmant.
When I
die, let there be plenty of pink cake,
enough
to say that I had a very good life,
full of sweet and beautiful things.
The morning of my birthday
I ate pain au chocolat
the tender silk and crunch I'd been dreaming
as long as there have been stars--
perfect with a Veuve Clicquot.
I ordered une coup de champagne
every single Paris day.
My first night, unexpectedly alone,
I sipped glass after glass,
writing in French
as if I was born to sin
in any language.
In Paris, there are poems written for the trees:
"if you have an arbor on your street,
your thoughts will be less difficult
your eyes more free
and you hands more desirous in the night."
full of sweet and beautiful things.
pain au chocolat |
The morning of my birthday
I ate pain au chocolat
the tender silk and crunch I'd been dreaming
as long as there have been stars--
perfect with a Veuve Clicquot.
breakfast Veuve Clicquot |
I ordered une coup de champagne
every single Paris day.
My first night, unexpectedly alone,
I sipped glass after glass,
writing in French
as if I was born to sin
in any language.
In Paris, there are poems written for the trees:
"if you have an arbor on your street,
your thoughts will be less difficult
your eyes more free
and you hands more desirous in the night."
In Luxembourg, I drank and ate where Hemingway drank and ate and thought of the liquor of oysters and brandy eaten with good bread that formed his days. I thought of the poetry of the paired-down line, and later, in Pere Lachaise, I left my pen on the grave of Gertrude Stein. My own days full of words and and food, as I'd hoped they'd be.
Paris, je t'aime. I will come again.
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