Cada día te extraño mi vida en Barcelona cada vez más. Mis amigos son algunas de las mejores personas que conozco. Tengo la suerte de conocerlos y yo los guardo en mi corazón para siempre. Aquí está mi regalo para ustedes, mis amigos: mucha de la escritura que hice en España con fotos de nuesto barrio. Sé que hay más, pero pero yo quería darle lo siguiente. Te amo, amigos, y la cuidad de Barcelona. Siempre.
in a coffee shop in El Born
One wall is lit. 10.20.09
(Like I am)
With shelves lined with liquid amber courage
Though Barcelona hardly needs a drop.
Black paneling rises to meet
Catalan vaulted archways from the guilds,
Ancient coffee bar steeping tradition.
Slow jazz trumpet music, blue smoke and glassclink
Are the backbone of this chic Euro local spot.
The middlelife gent behind the bar
knows everyone who comes in after work
and probably speaks Castellano, Catalan, y English.
Couples meeting up,
One arriving a full five minutes before the other.
Languid, unselfconscious kiss upon arrival,
Public passion con café con leche.
Hombre six inches away is chaim smoking,
(So I’m chain smoking)
and another one crosses the bar to pick up
a slip of paper I dropped under the table.
I’m across from the lit wall
(it’s fading for me now)
in the middle of a banquet of drinkers.
I look up from writing
And the gentleman whose gaze
I have been stealing all night
Is gone.
The manager clears away the cups
From the neighboring table
And wipes it with a cloth.
about our group of friends
Nuclear unit.
“A major challenge in all nuclear [families] is to ensure that a significant fraction of the fuel is consumed before [it] destroys itself.” -Encyclopedia, nuclear bomb
We are the fusion/fission complex
With lost keys at every hour,
Too much free time for extra spicy
Cooking experiments that end
With scalding peppers and far-wafting smells
That draw neighbors near.
Our apartment is the pulsing, moving core,
All electrons zing in and out - come in hungry,
Leave full (laughter-grilled chicken).
We are the transplanted nuclear family.
We swipe into our white picket fence daily,
And the only bicycles being ridden
Are 3am ‘adopted’ Bicing bikes in stretching hallways.
There are kids here growing up/down,
And we feed starving souls with friends.
Take turns in the two-parent portion of the equation
And someone always spinning
Something - slide three DJ’s in
The nuke like we do
And you’re bound to.
We all tilt back with our eyes closed
to watch the explosion:
after dinner satisfaction,
lick ice creams,
salt rims,
tequila bottle backlash.
The lights of Barcelona flare
And we’re out.
waiting for the Metro
:34:24:Entrada
Lean lean white jeans
that bleed to refuse the clean,
wasted washings that set streetdirt
in deep, dark wash seems
too-sweet T-strap peep-toe shoes
criss-cross prop those lean not-white jeans
against grotesque
graphic Metro walls to await
the train, the L1 home.
At : (colon) 34 the rumble comes,
the reverb runs, a click-clack
creative attack of
mass and steal the city back.
At : (colon) 24 the stale breeze begins
to turn the tunnel,
not stench like New York’s
grumpy Subway but old and
bright as Barcelona heartbeat.
The : (colon) 24 air lifts
grown out straight mane
to flighty fling out the
siesta-time sparse-packed station.
Lean jeans uncross and
blue shoes daintily dance up to
the platform peak
tiptoe chic
as digitals blink
ENTRADA
ENTRADA
in case you
missed the massive rushing
of the city’s darkwash seams
and the arriving train, the L1 home.
Pequito Barcelona
Little men with tiny dogs
Yip yip along without leashes, obedience
Catalans keep them cerda de casa en carrers de barrio.
La Vida de Barcelona:
Yes, I’m lisping on purpose
The rock and roll mulleted barista jumps onto the teak bar counter as café con leche cups clank, and starts to write the menu del dia in marker on the board. My Spanish coffee makes my tongue jump - there is very little leche in here. In the old heart of Barcelona this fresh market is the bustling center of life, nestled between the Barri Gotíc and El Born neighborhoods. Barcelona is best at night, careening wildly on the edge of the Mediterranean, but this morning rush is the pulse of life in Catalunya. At Bon Café, the tapas are prepared and fresh and enormous pescados stare at me from under glass on the iced counter. I swear the fish smell sweet here; we come home to the apartment to make pots thick with wine-steamed mussels for dinner, but never before 10pm. The old ladies walk each other to the Mercado to buy their daily bread - there’s little chance of avoiding the copious pan con tomate that is the staple of Catalan cuisine. Rub the toasted bread with a fresh tomato and oil - food is simple here.
Work is second to life in Spain. My Spanish friend Juando wisely told me, while watching the sun set over Africa, that Americans live to work, while the Spanish work to live. And such is reflected in this busy fresh market at 11am when everyone should be at work or school, but aren’t. Coffee and cigarette breaks are frequent and lengthy, and I can’t help but find it easy to fall into their patterns here. My classes demand little busy work, instead focusing on getting us more deeply connected to life in Barcelona. We walk through the ancient nooks of the city, Roman walls and Visigothic cathedrals, tiny pubs filled with old men at noon and trendy galleries in the seedy part of town. You can’t depend on anything being open from 2pm-7pm (even the police station shuts down), but the streets swell with locals until the other 2am-7am. Spaniards live their lives in the streets and we join them. On this morning as the Mediterranean breeze steals the napkin from my croissant, I can feel my finger on the pulse of Barcelona, hot and wild. We are crazy to live here.
