The more I find out about family
History
I realize
That being a traitor
Is simply in my bloodline
I'm a cheap rosé
Pretending to be fine wine
From French nobility
To Spanish pride
My ancestors wrought havoc
On their own modern times
It's time for me to step up to the plate
And make my choice
To grow into the role I was assigned
Or write my own lines
But whatever I choose
The choice is mine
And I know whoever I am
I'll be great
remembered
divine,
How do I know?
It's simply in my bloodline.

Dans la pâleur de l’hiver
un rayon de soleil triomphe
sur la palette de la
saison froide,
couvrant ainsi les couleurs
désaturées
d’une teinte de pêche dorée

~ ~ (on front of envelope)

La lettre que voici, ô bon facteur,
Portez-la jusqu'à la ville de NICE,
Aux ALPES-MARITIMES (06).
Donnez-la, s'il vous plaît, au Receveur

Des Postes, au bureau de NOTRE DAME.
(Son nom? C'est MONSIEUR LUCIEN COQUELLE.
Faut-il vraiment que je vous le rappelle?)
Cette lettre est pour lui et pour sa femme.

I won't lead English postmen such a dance;
Just speed this letter on its way to FRANCE.
Sender's address you'll find on the reverse.

~ ~ (and on the back)*

At Number 7 in St Swithun's Road,
Kennington, Oxford, there is the abode
Of me, Paul Hansford, writer of this verse.

- - - - - - - - - - - - -
For non-speakers of French, the first bit goes approximately -
"Dear Postman, Please take this letter to the town of Nice, in the département of Alpes-Maritimes, and give it to the postmaster at the Notre-Dame office. (His name? It's Lucien Coquelle. Do I really need to remind you?) This letter is for him and his wife."

Even if they're in a different language
They don't mean any less
Sometimes
They mean even more

la poésie est une manière de créer la
distance

où l'amour
entre nous
est trop pur

The curtain frays at the edges
Unwinds, disobedient
Only to reveal
No bed (where one should be)

Dainty white muslin
Conflicted, floats
Away from the pane
More like a halo (than a shroud)

Here, in the cage of your mind,
Lies a mandolin
Hollow (with no music in its heart)

Towards another window
Its brother may lie
Born of nothing (but of itself)

Green, yellow, red, stop.

I walked through a busy market in Paris until I hit a stoplight that left me without the knowledge of misfortune or pleasure awaiting me.

Either way, I'm glad I waited
because moments later here I am staring at what I hoped would be; the one.

I remember you were seated on your pastel blue bicycle,
the ones with the basket in the front carrying a baguette
I mean, how french can one get?

You had blonde hair, you were blue eyed
I still remember what you looked like.
You looked exactly like someone I thought I would never be right by

Face to face
You looked back at me and smiled.

It kinda reminded me of that one story by John Green where this dude named Augustus Waters met this girl named Hazel Grace and he falls in love with her in an instant so on and so forth because

This was something similar.

I didn't know you,
But I felt as if we potentially were operating on the same wavelength,
and I loved that.

It's crazy how only three seconds can paint out a situation that
makes it feel like a lifetime of what seemed to be only pure bliss.

Three seconds was all it took.
Three seconds was all it took for the stars that bled through your eyes to align with mine-
a constellation that only happened once in a lifetime

But who you think you are to me was just a girl riding her bicycle.
And I was just a boy pointing his camera at a direction towards someone of both beauty and of worth.
It was almost as though you were just a vision in my dream as she looked comforted

Yet her eyes stood out as if she had just smelled the scent of coffee.

In perfect constrast, her eyes, they glimmered, they shined brighter than all the stars within her.

But both beauty and worth couldn't comprehend to this feeling.

She was unstoppable and she took everything she ever wanted with a smile.

Red, yellow, green, go.

Three seconds turned out to what seemed to be that moment where time and only time stood still.

Three seconds turned out to what seemed to be three lifetimes.

Three seconds was all it took to imagine what my life would be without you by my side.

L’amour fait les plus grandes douceurs et les plus sensibles infortunes de la vie.

Love makes the greatest pleasures and most sensitive misfortunes of life.