The question

The same question came back to me, in an unexpected place this time, like usual. It was a girl—not older than seven—who climbed onto the bus with her mother and another woman dressed in bright loose florals that stood out against the tight bristling black Italian leather, chatting in a language that sounded strange even in this strange country. The girl sat across from me, and I smiled at her over my book. She didn’t smile back.

What if I had been her? What was it like to have straniera stamped plainly in your brown doe-eyes and dark straight hair, to already know your place—your place as a foreigner in a country that would look down on you as rubbish come to steal their wealth; your place in a home where even little women were seen and not heard. Would I have resigned myself to my fate? Would I have even known that the rest of the world might resent it, might have something different? Would I have searched for a loving God?

I dropped my eyes back to my book, sinking into a place farther from here than even my home is, culturally if not geographically. But I could feel the eyes on my face, and I wondered what she was wondering.

Binario 2 in fog

Standing here
Upon the precipice of time
Between the end and the beginning.

Do not cross the yellow line.

It is perilous, terrible with
Fireanddangerandsword.

The fog surrounding isolates me,
Life-fog icing over as it parts
From the human body;
Smoke clouding from a million mouths obscures their flickering flames—
The only lights I see are red.
And I am distant from you,

Distinct

Apart

Standing here, next to me,
Beginning on the end,
Waiting for the whistle which will bring us back to life.

Taxi!

Apt. 2 & 3

apartment (1)

"This is what is laughingly known as my apartment..." It's been painted since--a buttery-ish slightly warmer color, and is lacking the ladder as decor. The blue on the couch is really a sheet--much cheaper and much more to my taste than all the real couch covers I looked at. The things on the shelf are my tazzini (little coffee cups for espresso) and tea candles, for when I am feeling candle-y.