Sometimes, a free moment is all it takes to fill a
personal time with the lament that it is already too late to live it again.
Sometimes, there can be only one memory to make you unnoticed to all around you. You become your own island; no one notices a tiny island in the ocean. And the island is covered in night blooming jasmine, coquelicot and gardenia flowers which fall in the ocean and float around the island. Around you. And it is the memory of that one who passed that stays in suspense upon these fields of flowers and smells. But unannounced, the aroma from a pine tree in April, or the taste of Arabic coffee on a hot August noon suddenly freezes all around you. You become who you were when you were wondering what you would, one day, become.
Sometimes, all it takes is the sigh of a woman cozy under a blanket. A simple act of selfishness that is suddenly shared and treasured. And you recall the night under the stars; and you almost smell again the acrid smell of the room. And the woman under the blanket now has curly dark locks; and a minute later she is a brunette with a lingering cough. And then she has no face. And when you want to kiss her, you see she has your face. And you do not want to kiss your own lips. So you shut your eyes and stay next to her, because sometimes, all it takes is the woolly smell of an old blanket.
White wine has a place in moments when the regret is to not having time left to try again. Perhaps to do it right this time. Perhaps just to listen as the only act of loving. White wine is fine for regret. But when the memory is for those wondering eyes; when the world of every day becomes too small for an old thought, and when the name of a flower is all you need to feel against the harsh, woolly blanket upon your aching hips. Then the present becomes a must to live while regretting that you cannot live as who you thought you would become when you did not know who you were. On those times, wine has to be of old tannins; wine has to come from old vines. Wine that can only be deeply incarnadine. On those days, such wine should be drank alone upon a balcony still wet of the afternoon showers. A balcony where others made love. Often. And left doubt in every corner of the Terra Cotta floor.
And, sometimes, you realize who you are. It happens within the space of making green tea in a two star hotel room. Or after drinking Puerto Rico's rum on a busy beach late in the night. And that realization is disappointing because you knew who you were all along but did not want to face it. You had hoped that someone from under that blanket will tell you a different story. A story you would believe; a story you could tell yourself when the wine is white and the days predictable.
But often, there is no one to tell you a story about yourself. It is you against the hope of a different time. And you lose. Because you cannot be who you never were.
Sometimes, there can be only one memory to make you unnoticed to all around you. You become your own island; no one notices a tiny island in the ocean. And the island is covered in night blooming jasmine, coquelicot and gardenia flowers which fall in the ocean and float around the island. Around you. And it is the memory of that one who passed that stays in suspense upon these fields of flowers and smells. But unannounced, the aroma from a pine tree in April, or the taste of Arabic coffee on a hot August noon suddenly freezes all around you. You become who you were when you were wondering what you would, one day, become.
Sometimes, all it takes is the sigh of a woman cozy under a blanket. A simple act of selfishness that is suddenly shared and treasured. And you recall the night under the stars; and you almost smell again the acrid smell of the room. And the woman under the blanket now has curly dark locks; and a minute later she is a brunette with a lingering cough. And then she has no face. And when you want to kiss her, you see she has your face. And you do not want to kiss your own lips. So you shut your eyes and stay next to her, because sometimes, all it takes is the woolly smell of an old blanket.
White wine has a place in moments when the regret is to not having time left to try again. Perhaps to do it right this time. Perhaps just to listen as the only act of loving. White wine is fine for regret. But when the memory is for those wondering eyes; when the world of every day becomes too small for an old thought, and when the name of a flower is all you need to feel against the harsh, woolly blanket upon your aching hips. Then the present becomes a must to live while regretting that you cannot live as who you thought you would become when you did not know who you were. On those times, wine has to be of old tannins; wine has to come from old vines. Wine that can only be deeply incarnadine. On those days, such wine should be drank alone upon a balcony still wet of the afternoon showers. A balcony where others made love. Often. And left doubt in every corner of the Terra Cotta floor.
And, sometimes, you realize who you are. It happens within the space of making green tea in a two star hotel room. Or after drinking Puerto Rico's rum on a busy beach late in the night. And that realization is disappointing because you knew who you were all along but did not want to face it. You had hoped that someone from under that blanket will tell you a different story. A story you would believe; a story you could tell yourself when the wine is white and the days predictable.
But often, there is no one to tell you a story about yourself. It is you against the hope of a different time. And you lose. Because you cannot be who you never were.
March 23, 2020
© Vahé A. Kazandjian, 2020
PS/ The photo is from my balcony of the night sky against the mountain range. I think there was a shooting star on the upper right quadrant of the frame.
