"How can two souls, with their own wells of stories and fears and delights and tears, so far from each other's presence and premises and thoughts, look exactly the same?"--SC.
It all began at the end of another day;
On an evening with faint footsteps—behind the shy sunset,
With an eyes that were craving for sweet sleep;
I closed my day with a heart too tired to weep.
With him still in my mind, and a melted heart back again,
I frequented the bus stop once more—
But too thought I had caught a ghost:
A ghost of him trapped within thee;
You with his charms, and within his body;
You with his gaze, and the smooth dark hair he has;
You with his chin, and the faint blushes to it;
You in his jacket, with a bag slung loosely over your shoulder.
Nikolaas, ah, you reminded me of him at that instant;
Nikolaas, that perhaps even He has left behind;
Nikolaas, that once entertained my young artist's heart;
Nikolaas, that wailed and pleaded funnily like a young infant;
Nikolaas, that often woke me with his childish cry;
Nikolaas, that failed to sew a long brown tapestry;
Nikolaas, that held my poetry book over the literary summer;
Nikolaas, with whom I spent too much time together.
Nikolaas, whose calls oft' distracted my lessons;
Nikolaas, who at whose mischief laughed very charmingly;
Nikolaas, who to my words listened willingly;
Nikolaas, who in his brown pyjamas startled me every day.
But you were too realistic to be deemed artistic, Gianluca;
You were even more hopeful than the tainted earth grounds;
You lent to me a bashful terrific smile;
You charmed me, though with his charm, for a long while;
You are but his soul told in another way;
This I knew when with a bold smile you nodded at me;
A smile that was more melodious than the purplish skies.
The skies just sneered at our florid scene;
With insatiable glances they boasted of their silk;
Spat thunder onto the shivering glass beneath our feet;
Before they swore and took a chance to run and fleet.
Fleet, fleet away, like an unconscious, insane rainbow,
As if there would not be another day.
As if the world would end as tomorrow ended,
As if no rain would dismay the earth by its cold colour.
Gianluca, I was as wet as clouds—over there, by the bus stop,
My soaked hair had made myself turn grey; pale, and—before you came,
I had become again disillusioned, once more.
How could two beings look exactly the same—that I understand not,
But you made me gasp as I caught you first in my sight.
Your eyes, that were more European than the crying night,
Your hair, that was funnier than the unmet moonlight,
And your aura, that was more serious than a dream.
Ah, Gianluca, how could you be as numerous as him!
Tell me now, your stories from Italy;
And the city of Rome you had ridden across;
Ah, but my sweet Nikolaas is from Amsterdam;
In which all years are pale with white snow and dust;
And a scattered whiteness—a shrieking pale gloss.
Gianluca, Gianluca, still—you are all but a filmed mirror of my Nikolaas,
My little prince, that once attained and tightened his grip of my ****** soil,
My dear husband, that once entertained me with the brass and grass of his toil.
My naughty love, that ran jumping about the following morning;
My very own darling, with his own explosive moods,
But no tears once appeared in his moonlit eyes.
Ah, Gianluca, how I could see none but my lost prince in thee!
Gianluca, my dear, but are you perhaps more sincere than him?
Remind me that reality is but not another horror like dreams,
For my days, ever since he left, hath been a nightmare,
A nightmare my heart has failed to tease, and burn dryly away,
A nightmare that has fallen onto the top of my every single cell.
Gianluca, and your red mouth was as bright as the red sunset;
Just like the lips of my darling back then—which started to smile as our eyes met.
Gianluca, Gianluca, but tell me now—shall I ever meet thee again?
My Nikolaas might still be alive—but his image is dead within me,
He has fallen for his evil night aurora; an Aurora that, sadly, is not like me, Estefannia.
Gianluca, dry is my throat, hungered is my tongue;
But you fired me against those like a poem;
Your shadow was to me like a little ghost—and perhaps is still,
Your sight made me fear, and my stomach churn ill—
While your hands were just a few turns away.
Perhaps you can assure me again, that you are not him;
You are new, with an unsinned soul—and untainted;
Tell me that you are pure—that you are whom I have sought;
Even though you are still him to my ****** dreams;
With a voice within which he used to say;
With a smile within which he lived my days;
Ah, in my mind now, there is but a jumbled forest of thoughts;
A whole well of unheard mirages—that I shall craft into dear, dear poetry;
Ah, but who knows everything except that He gives to know;
And who sees everything but that He makes our destiny;
Ah, Gianluca, perhaps I shall see you again amongst tonight's traffic;
When days but grow low, and dusk reclaims its fair relic;
When dawn is prepared—with the night maddening about at hand;
As I return from my errands—after attending to my books and friends.
Gianluca, Gianluca, Gianluca no matter how much you are like him;
Perhaps you are better at luring my souls;
And the treaties by which they feel satisfied not.
You are the fallen star—that I have hoped for;
You are the sanguine angel I have never met before;
Ah, and if this was the case, would you always be there for me?
And thus, my dear, but can this time—you see me by unlasting daylight?
Perhaps you look only more like him by the night;
And as dawn greets, and noon appears fast;
I think you shall claim your own image;
Confirming that to me, your charm shall always last.
Gianluca, Gianluca, Gianluca,
How I miss, miss, and miss him in my sordid dreams;
I've missed him far too terribly—and at times, unjustly;
He, the son of storm and the child of mystery;
He, the lad of madness—the angel of scrutiny;
And to this day still but I miss him, my dear Nikolaas,
The little, little darling naughtiest—yet most beloved to my heart.
But still, show me what you can say onto my poetry;
Show me what you can see, and what you may keep in mind;
Show me, perhaps, the threads of another love story;
Another gracious tale—with him I shall never find.