warmth

the lighter flame warms the tip of his nose the instant it takes in lighting the cigarette. then it returns to cold. he wishes for a fire. a blaze to warm his body by. his nose pinches deep down in its abyss. there's a virus in the air. flu's stalking. his throat is dry. he swallows dryness. his lips burn. they are dry and announce the impending eruption of a cold sore.
he brings the cigarette to his lips cursing the smoke as it curls up his nostril. curses himself for smoking a smoke. his breath wheezes in past his teeth. past his tongue. and down. he inhales the thick smoke with difficulty. as he takes the filter from his lips, it rips a little skin. he winces out the gray smoke and with the front of his tongue, touches the snarling sore before licking the rest of his lips. the relief is as momentary as it is instant. he swallows dryness. he ashes his cigarette and rests it on the edge of the bench he sits on. he rubs his hands. massaging some indiscernible warmth into the cold slow joints. he doesn't remember when he was last this cold. he yawns and again his lips tear. he is quick to lick them for brief relief. he yawns again. carefully this time.
he pinches his cigarette off from the edge of the bench. he lifts it to his face and decides against it, letting the cigarette drop with his hands. he keeps it lodged between his fingers and places his hands on his belly. then he lifts the cigarette to his lips and drags another fix. he curses himself as the smoke wheezes out but keeps the cigarette burning if only for the heat of the glowing red ember on top.
another yawn emits from his heavy head. he hardly feels the searing lips. tired. heavy from cold exhaustion. he closes his eyes and drops his head forward a little. and a little more. his thick beard folding on the polyester of his jacket. his thoughts slipping further and further to where vague jumbled images become clearer and clearer. to where he feels the red cherry on top of the long white cigarette stick burning brighter and stronger and finally keeping him warm.

the angel in the bar

she asked him a question to get started.
"do you do anything beside what you do here?
he looked at her slightly offended thinking she thought less of him. but she smiled to let him know no harm was intended. his blond angel curls smiled back at her and a connection was made.
"i blow new forms in glass. it is my reason for being." he grinned to make the second part of the statement seem less intensely serious than it sounded. although he could never imagine a statement he felt more serious about.
but he was too late. her young heart was filled with a new sense of direction. she had never heard something so perfect. and had she seen his radiant smile, this new direction could only have been confirmed. she decided to ask for a beer. something she had never done.
"have you ever blown a new form?" she asked immersed in his eyes which shimmered like stormy gray crystal balls in his sockets. her butt found somewhere to sit without looking.
he admitted that he had not yet managed a new form in glass but defended this by saying that this had never actually been done by anyone but the first glass blowers in history thousands of years before.
she was impressed at the time it had taken for him to manage such a feat and felt confidently drunk by just looking at the beer he had set in front of her. she picked it up but felt too giddy to actually take a sip.
duty called the curly haired angel away into the kitchen and she looked at her imaginary friend whom she imagined only in her drunken giddiness for a cue on what to do next. but her friend had disappeared into the thin air from which she would have come. she was on her own. and, being on her own, she decided to leave. she was buzzing from her untouched drink and the butterflies in her heart. never had she felt so perfectly perfect.
she walked up the steps out of the bar. suddenly, without surprise, she felt his strong arms lift her up a tiny bit off the ground. she didn't dare look back in fear it might not be true. that it was just her imagination.
she was sure she wasn't touching the ground as she walked into the street. she had never walked as lightly. she jumped. only to land a tiny bit above the sidewalk. she was definitely floating. the angel had given her wings and nothing she ever did would be quite the same again.

olives in a jar

i never wondered what i was doing there in the bakery. i was there to buy garlic olives for the picnic with my mother and sister. here they had the best i had ever tasted. this i remember from the last time i was here. and yet, somehow, i had never before been in this shop, had never seen the smiling young attendant or even been in this city, this country, this time. but i never questioned that this was where i needed to be.
my mother was inspecting the different breads they had on offer. my sister has taken charge of choosing some pastry. the smells were floating in and out of my senses, i could almost touch the taste i my nostrils. i looked at the empty buckets where once the olives had been. they were empty of garlic olives. just a few regular ones left.
my mother told me what bread to order, my sister the pastry. i had been there before so it was my task to speak.
"are there any garlic olives left?" i ask the blonde man behind the counter.
"no, they need to be ordered. there's just the regular ones." he pulls out a catalogue and says he will place the order immediately.
a man walks into the shop. the little bell tingles as he crosses the mat. he is a slick looking man in a suit. there's a smile on his face but, unlike the young man behind the counter, the suited man wears a plastic smile. he introduces himself to all of us. he is a politician in parliament.
"it is my goal to do something about the traffic congestion." he states. and i think that is a good thing.
"by building more roads, there will be less traffic jams." he continues. and i think this i a bad thing.
i smile and tell him he won't get my vote. i think my mother and sister are smiling at this comment but they are behind me. i pay the counter attendant and we leave in a concert of tingling bells. no olives.
much later, i wake up from a dream. as i focus my eyes, i realize i am in a large waterbed. on one side of the bed, against the wall, is a large cupboard with two large tanks of olives in its center. as i sit on the edge of the bed i can see the olives floating weightlessly in the liquid. they are dancing around each other as if in a space capsule. there is a scoop next to the jars and i rise to use it. as i get closer, the jars become smaller and the olives appear suddenly packed into two small supermarket store jars. i see that behind the jars is a mirror and think that mirrors sometimes make objects appear larger than they really are. i decide to leave the olives and i return to the bed and sleep.

pain

it was a nasty sudden sensation. his left ear stung with excruciating pain. from the core of the drum straight into the brain. in a jerk reaction, he clasped the shell with both hands as if to shut the pain out. but it persisted. stinging like before, with even a slight jaw movement intensifying the agony. he let his ear lay in his hand, his head on top and waited.
then it subsided. as quickly as it came, it was gone.
but the memory of the pain was still there. a little after ache which kept his left hand held tightly on his ear as if afraid something might fall out. he walked into the other space and took out a cu tip. he inserted it into his ear as if to remove all the remaining pain and leave it on the soft white tip. he studied it. there was nothing on the tip except a nearly imperceptible smear of ear wax. no blood. no huge quantities of puss. nothing like what he expected for the pain was too great for there to be no evidence left from it.
"the pain shot through my ear," he explained to the man who had come to his side.
the man looked carefully at the ear, then at the cu tip."is it still hurting?" he asked.
"no, the pain is gone now."
"well then, everything is alright." the man walked out of the space.
the other man looked into the large mirror on the wall and again at the cu tip. he could see no difference in his face. the memory of the pain was almost indiscernible. it appeared that everything was alright. he threw the cu tip into the small waste bin and walked out to the other space.
everything seemed to be fine.

inside the white room

outside the sun blasts. i feel it trying to push into the room through tightly shut blinds. earlier, when i opened the door which leads outside, a burst of heat and light threw me back. a squinting imbecile retreating back into the cool safety.
the room is empty except for a table and a chair. a mat lies in one corner pretending at a bed. thin covers are crumpled from a restless night. hot dreams. always hot dreams. the pillow, sculpted in the last desperate embrace of the morning, lies lonely.
i hear footsteps walking past the room's windows.
there are three windows to one side, the door is facing them opposite. it has a little window with dark glass. it keeps most of the light out but the ferocity of the sun can be gauged by looking at it. but for the moment my attention is focused solely on the sound from outside. which has now all but disappeared. just an improbable memory. i squirm to listen. nothing. just the hot sun beating at the window. for the rest silence.
i sit against the wall. white and cool. i feel the hard cold through my thin shirt. it enforces my feeling of safety. the strong hard white walls. thick. it is impossible to penetrate into the square volume of the room. this can't be said for the fragile glass of the windows. covered by mere blinds which appear to be moving from the heat. curtains in the solar wind. it think of the footsteps. or was it the sun, knocking to get in. i bring my knees to my chin, huddled against the wall i feel a semblance of safety.
i hear voices. again from outside and my little world inside is thrown into frantic turmoil. i can't hear their specific words. they mumble hastily, their footsteps rushing past. i find myself at the window. my ears pressed against the air between the blinds and my straining head. the voices are gone. i think. i pace the room. i am uneasy. unable to understand what i have heard. footsteps and voices outside seem impossible. the ferocious light. the angry heat.
i spend the hours in anxious anticipation caught in the desperate idea that there was really something outside. someone perhaps. but the sounds don't return. and the day passes.
as the sun sets, and the next sun rises i lay down on the mat exhausted for sleep. i wake into a dream and feel the slow approach of the devilish heat. i grip my pillow in a tight embrace. hot dreams. always hot dreams.

tourist

she spoke loudly. loud enough that people heard. she was speaking for their benefit. to show them she was from here. that she understood the ways. speaking the language tells people you're not foreign.
her fat friend mumbled an answer. his name is edwin and he secretly lusts after the fiery red head. but like so many, he is frozen with fear. doesn't realize she is as desperate as him. would gladly get between his layers for a bit of comfort sex. sex. he looks sheepishly through his glasses. they slip off his sweaty nose. pushes them back up. he mumbles because he is not as secure in the use of german. his answers are a small 'ja' and 'nein'. he is frozen with fear that he will give away the game. that the foreign strangers will know they are a fraud. that they are really americans. what a master plan of her's to speak only german in public. she had made him look so local in copenhagen. speaking german. loudly. of course copenhagen was not technically germany, but everyone there seemed to understand. german, like english, is an international mode of communication. he smiles inwardly at being with her in copenhagen.
an american family of four struggle past, searching for a place to sit. tourists. she hates tourists. almost without thinking, she shouts germanically at edwin. asks him whether he wants to switch from the floor to the seat. the train is packed. the only seat open to them is next to some occupied others, by the bikes, close to the exit. edwin squirms his pudgy back against an empty bike rack. he looks deadly uncomfortable.
he whispers "nein." continues squirming. she writes in her notebook diary. the passenger next to her looks cautiously at the contents. he is not surprised the words are english. he reads about beer in copenhagen, and laughter with her friend. he reads how sweet edwin is for giving her the seat. he thinks it might be a letter. there is a lack of honesty in the words. they are to be read by eyes other than hers. maybe she secretly hopes edwin will go through her bag when she is showering at the youth hostel later. that he will read her positive thoughts about him.
she needs to get up. to move around. leave the uncomfortable folding seat. 'sit edwin,' she commands in german. her accent a parody on an american tourist pretending to be european. edwin eagerly gets of the floor and whispers something in thanks. he waddles into the seat as she graces the corridor to the toilet. he is sweating more than he would like. he raises his large arm to wipe his neck.
she returns and sits across of him. on the floor. she smiles at him. or at her democratic goodness for letting him sit there a bit longer. she takes out the pad again and writes. looks at a passenger and writes. looks at another passenger and writes. the passenger next to edwin gets the most attention. when he looks up, she quickly dashes down to her pad writing down important things like the color of his shirt and his hairstyle. secretly, she wanted to sit across of him because she couldn't stare from the seat. stare and write down this wonderful material. she smiles as she naturally suppresses this honest motive, thinking instead how nice it is to let edwin continue to use the seat.

the day

through the window i could see the dark clouds pulling over the city. the contrast with the yellow building in the window frame was enough to make me feel like tears. or was it the solemn piano playing through the building in my head. light would burst white through the heavy clouds in strips. the melancholy perfection.
my mind wandered and i left the table, the kitchen and was led by the sound as it played through the maze of the building. i hear the first heavy drop fall on the window, followed by others. big heavy rain. an accompaniment to the piano for which i continue to search.
the music leads me up and down narrow stairs. through low passage ways. through halls and empty rooms. all the time the rain playing with the piano. and i wonder where my friends have gone. whether they are all really too busy to play. to speak of wine and cigarettes. to speak of the blues. of getting wet.
i reach yet another door and from behind it it feels like the music swells. i open it and float into it. the clouds are from heaven and i cannot feel the floor under my feet. still i move through the room which has become more of a space than a room. and the building, though huge, could never be big enough to house this enormous space.
and as i glide through the clouds below i can see the earth unfold. a giant ball of blue. the piano in my head has joined the voices that sing the songs. and i glide on down to where i open my eyes in the beautiful room, looking as the sun breaks on the yellow building. and all the songs are one.

rejection was swift

rejection was swift. an age ago from where he walks now. he puts one foot in front of the other. another step further away. his back to hers. he wants to look behind him. another step passes. he wonders if he has picked up the pace. if he has started walking faster since passing her. running away from the rejection. yet another step passes. there must be ten steps between them now. back to back. too late now. he walks on. doesn't look back. will never know whether she turned around or kept walking too.
the street had been empty in the brisk sunlight of morning. he had seen her turning into it. had seen her instantly. their eyes had met over the vast distance. and as the world slowed down, they walked toward each other. in the vast expanse of time which passed, he saw their life together unfold. he could feel her first caress of his face. taste their first kiss. see their beautiful children play in a large green yard. as her perfect features become clearer with each step, he felt as if they were sailing toward each other. in perfect synchronicity. floating closer and closer.
then, suddenly, they are within contact range. this is where he needs to speak. needs to... engage her eyes. needs to find a smile. the right words. a compliment. anything. he shifts his eyes to hers. hers glance at his. and a split second is all it takes. his mind jumbles the words before they find voice. he chokes and screams desperately to himself. an awkward squawk. and like a swift wind, she breezes past. nothing more than a stranger on a sunlit street. rejection was swift.
another step and he leaves the street and the moment behind for good. but he is not despondent. as he falls back into his regular walking pace, he is comforted by the fact that around every corner lies a new opportunity to walk into his perfect future. every step a little closer. and the sun shines on.