Brian’s Reflection: Monday, September 17, 2007


Its door opens near. It's a shrine
by the road, it's a flower in the parking lot
of The Pentagon, it says "Look around,
listen. Feel the air." It interrupts
international telephone lines without a tune.
When traffic lines jam, it gets out
and dances on the bridge. If great people
get distracted by fame they forget
this essential kind of breathing
and they die inside their gold shell.
When caravans cross deserts
it is the secret treasure hidden under the jewels.

Sometimes commanders take us over, and they
try to impose their whole universe,
how to succeed by daily calculation:
I can't eat that bread.

- William Stafford


About 7:00am, I would set out from the little apartment about two thirds the way up into the old town. Menton, the city of lemons! The apartment was in a little cave cut out from the rock, with a heavy wooden door, handcarved, sometime in the 17th century. The apartment, I was told, was over 500 years old.

In the warm morning air, I walk past the open church to the the bakery. Buy a baguette, warm from the wood-fired oven, pop it into my string bag on my back. A walk down to the lower town, lazily, wandering through the narrow streets, enjoying the geraniums in their wall clay pots, and the birds singing in their wooden cages hanging from the windows. Next, the fruit vendor. A lime and a peach, warm from the early morning sun. On to the market for a small terrine de lapin (rabbit). And a small cut of butter wrapped in butcher’s paper. My trusty Swiss Army knife hanging from my belt – those were the pre-terrorist days.

The beach. Plunk down my little folding chair, put my straw mat under my feet on the pebbles. Watch the light brighten on the sea. Eat slowly, a slice of warm bread, butter, a slice of rabbit terrine, a little lime squeezed. Strong coffee from the man on the sidewalk by the beach. A book, hat. Walk the shore. Napping. Oops - time for lunch!

“It’s a flower in the parking lot ….. Look around ….. Listen ….. Feel the air ….. dance on the bridge ….. breathe ….. (don’t) die in your golden shell.” When commanders, of whatever kind, try to impose their killing issues of whatever kind, say simply:

“I can’t eat that bread”.

Brian+