oxford-paris

"Would you like to go out and play?"
she used to say, over the phone,
free of speech in her city
as I was working
in the heart of the other

the rive droite city, the one and only,
the slow-beat city,
the universe-city they'd say loudly
the ones from there, scribbling their scribbles
black ink on white paper.

"Sorry sweetie, I used to whisper,
can't go out and play".
I had my games there,
paid the rent in some weird kind of way
"later maybe" I'd say, thinking "surely"

and crossing the river later on in the day
in rive gauche I'd arrive and see her surely
with l'amour and all these kind of things.

Both of us then would admire,
safe from the other side,
the reassuring sight of sunset
the universe-city sinking as fast as a Titanic.