There’s a pizzeria on the corner of Prinsengracht and Rozengracht with Chagall windows and a man who calls me gorgeous when he touches my arm and says goodnight. I wonder what else he’d say to me, a New York girl with a last name of flowers, who ordered pasta and a Long Island iced tea, without the Long Island, because that would say too much.
I wonder what he’d tell himself, how much he’d understand, how much I’d let him know.
And now with an ocean between us and my view of the Manhattan skyline, I find myself falling back into apathy.
But with a hint of want.
Dangerous–
like looking in mirrors when you know your perception’s cracked.
And I do.
I’m past the dock and across the canal and the reflection is distorted so it must be okay. The streets are clean until they’re filled. With people. And then with their remains. Reminders that life has been lived. Is being lived.
I want to live.
