Cities in Other Countries

 Been here and there over the years. Hardly everywhere. Never wanted to go everywhere.

Twice to Paris, now that Paris is a suppurating sore, no thank you. Saw it at its height, thank you.

London once, when I was ten. Still the smog I couldn’t breathe and still the rubble of the blitz my dad showed off to me, while they dragged us to the Tower and Parliament and the British Museum, and we, my sister and me, could both see that it was great and big and lost. It stank and it was done,

Since then I have been to many nations. As a businessman, Frankfurt, Stuttgart, Wiesbaden, Milan, Zurich, Paris, and only Paris was glamorous, yet stricken in its heart. Couldn’t wait to get home to my unfaithful wife at the time. At least she had an Ohio hug and didn’t hate men as a philosophical proposition,. So we divorced. Nietzsche conquered Ohio too and I wound up alone.

Bogota, Colombia. Red tiles upon awakening, as far as the eye can see. Three million Colombians, all scared of cartels. I was dumb. Never thought South America had people in it. Until a swanky Detroiter executive smashed her briefcase on my head and couldn’t apologize. Everybody else in the airport did. But their steak tasted like burned cowboy boots. I left loving them and never wanting to return, except now I knew they were there,

Hong Kong. It takes 18 hours of flying to get there. The flight attendants are enough to make you propose every minute. And the harbor is the very best you’ve ever seen, a near perfect ovoid, and why did God make this moment of temptation for every other thief in the world? 

Cancun, Mexico. Enlightenment. You just burn to death. Fire is light . We escaped Cancun for Chitzchen Itza. I climbed that pyramid. I was still alive enough to do that. No longer. My wife didn’t climb that pyramid or climb it down, but she still knows I missed something important. But WHAT?