london thoughts

London had always understood trains. Understood the quiet pleasure of rushing through the countryside, of disembarking on a platform and being in a different place. Even when the trains sunk underground and the buildings climbed skyward. They understood the patience in it. The ability to stand still and move forward. They understood. They still do.

And so they line up, queuing for a journey made so many times before. A different kind of migration. Still as heavy and settled as those before. On ships, on foot, on trains. It was not easy. But it was life. And for that moment, things could be simple. For that moment, I understood too.

I suppose I still had questions. I found myself searching faces, as if I would find answers in work muddled strangers. As if the baggage underneath their eyes carried something more than just lack of sleep.

I’d heard once that if a man tired of London, he tired of life. I didn’t know if I believed that through my aching muscles and tired feet. But despite the dull throbbing in my dehydrated head, I felt as if I’d stumbled upon a truth meant for someone much older and wiser. That truth being, despite the sucking monotony of what had been my day, this city was the closest to a phoenix anyone would ever see. Ancient and new, dying and being born, daily, hourly, moment by moment. Close enough to the world to keep it’s finger on the pulse , but out here alone on an island, with no choice to grow in and up.

Yet for all this truth I’d found, I still had my questions. Like who had been born here? Who had been raised here? How many were like me, merely wishing to have some claim to this place despite our foreign heartbeats. Despite the other land I was from, I found my heart aching to call this place home. It was nothing too foreign, familiar enough to become my own.

My own city had the same nicotine scent. The same caffeinated drumming, lulled into silence by a beer or a whiskey. Yet, for all its similarities, the difference rang out louder and louder the more time I spent here.

Both were islands, true. But one felt rooted while the other seemed to float. Maybe it’s because this place carried weight. It was made of stone and blood, not dreams and plastic. There was no promise of golden streets or American dreams. The scar tissue of this city wouldn’t let that happen. We knew the grime- the blood and dirt and shit that had gone into this place had only served to fertilize the things that now grew with abundance. It reminded me that I was not buried, I was planted. And I too could take the blood and dirt and shit and use to grow. And to root.

I had thought of New York as magical. And I still do. But it is a showman’s magic. It is glitter and farce, sleight of hand and trickery. London’s magic is something much more ancient. It is evident in the fairytales, in the flowers, in the colors not painted, but bloomed from within the very earth of the city itself. I don’t mean to say one is better than the other. I’ve found magic in both places. I’ve found renewal, and I’ve found exhaustion. But one felt like home, and try as I might, I couldn’t deny the one truth I knew so deep in my soul.

I knew it from the way I could still smell that foreign air. The way that language sat so easily upon my tongue. I knew what breath meant when there. Not practiced shallow reinforcement, but simple, deep breath. I knew it like I knew a lovely secret, unable to hurt anyone if shared, but all the better when kept to oneself. And I planned to keep it.