In all of Paris' grandeur, from Place de la Concorde
to bakery-scented boulevards - I searched for intimacy.
This metropolis knows how to keep its cars in excess:
even the sirens contain a tinge of sadness, and I,
I'd always mark this place a six-hour-drive away
into dilusion; a suicide ground to lovelorn souls.
Oddly enough, the metropolitain's arc reminded me
of mistletoes, but I kept my eyes glued to my shoes
and still stepped into a pebble or two.
It was only at a second-hand bookshop
that I found peace with my loneliness;
cinnamon crepe half-melting in one hand
and the other one tracing fingerprints
just to experience how it feels like
to connect with a stranger.
That stranger left me a note within the book I bought.
"This book will change your life."
In my memory, I saw its pages cutting me
at the local library, maybe warning me
that all I've ever been trying to do
was making myself seem sophisticated.
I know, because there are leather-bound lovestories
left untouched at the shelf above my bed,
and Paris might as well snuggle somewhere in-between.
It means Paris wasn't romance.
It means Paris was reality.
