There is a Dream, Amsterdam

There is a dream, where I am living in Amsterdam

I often seek it out for comfort, a feeling always chased,

When watching the news or,

Like clockwork, when a bicycle bell would ring,

I am there, on The Lindengracht, in green scarf and a red shoe.

The canals bustle, long-boats carry weary eye’d foreigners and bright, bubbling children,

After a full day of writing and sitting at cafés in the cold sunlight,

I pull my body back into my skin,

Surrounded by music, and laughter, and the ebbing darkness,

I am whistling to the moon,

Daring it to come down and dance with me,

And together dip into the sudden, bustling evening.

This was my imagining of a happier, quieter life

A comfort that I often overrun with fleeting hopes of reality.