Poetry

Goodbye French House

Goodbye French House
Goodbye to 6:15 à table and menus that are, of course, always on time
Goodbye to incredibly talented chefs inspiring me to try new things
Goodbye to ice cream flavours as delicious as they are ridiculous
Goodbye to engineers crafting everything from websites to shawarma machines
Goodbye to oddly warped elliptical pans and inevitably unevenly cooked omelettes
Goodbye to athletes biking across the continent without breaking a sweat
Goodbye to #quoteboard; may the things written therein never see the light of day
Goodbye to musicians who are unequivocally better than they pretend to be
Goodbye to bowls on fire alarms to save the kitchen
Goodbye to chess prodigies whose power increases the more glasses they wear
Goodbye to four dozen topperwares with four dozen non-matching lids
Goodbye to academic powerhouses already changing the world for the better
Goodbye to wonderfully kooky charts that are more often than not rather problematic
Goodbye to DnD players fearlessly taking on dragons and krakens
Goodbye to Friday cookteam, my beloved; may your menus continue to be spectacular

Goodbye to the people that I love
Goodbye to everything that made me feel at home

Love and thank you for everything.

24/5/26

Climb!

Climb!
Let not your restless soul yearn ever for distant summits
Climb!
Let not your curious eyes be fixed upon remote heights
Climb!
Let not your bright heart become tethered to this solemn earth
Climb!
Let not your wandering feet seek only well-trodden paths

To climb is to live,
and to live is to climb!

23/8/26

Of Mountains

I dream of mountains
of granite glory aflame in golden morning glow
of indomitable peaks stretched into endless blue
of cascadia fall thundering from mist-born heights
of valleys awash in shadows of unfolded earth
of ephemeral walls painted upon feathered sky
of silvered pines in moonlight peering over cliffside

Arise!
For there are mountains to be climbed!

23/8/26

To Someone I Left Behind

I don’t know how to say the things I want to say.
But if I don’t say them right now, I know I will regret it tomorrow.
And the day after.
And every tomorrow to come.
So today I’ll cry.
Tomorrow I’ll sit on a plane looking out the window, seeing what could’ve been gradually disappear as the tears slowly dry on my cheeks.

I don’t want to go.
When I’m with you, I get to be the most myself I ever have.
You make me feel inspired
and beautiful
and alive.
You make me feel like me.

I will miss so many things in my new life, but the miles between us weigh the most heavily when I think about you.
I’m hanging on to the public bathroom map that we got from the library because I worry I’ll forget about the most mundane memories I have of you.
And I’ll cry again if I forget even a single moment of the time we’ve spent together.

And I know.
I know.
Knowing makes it worse.
Knowing is what makes me cry.
I know this is nothing, and this is ridiculous. You have your life and your friends, and I have no idea how you feel, and we are going to be apart for so long.
And I don’t want to change anything…
But…

I love talking with you.
I love sitting quietly without talking to you.
I love cooking with you.
I love walking with you.
I love watching movies with you.
I love listening to music with you, music that you play for the dozenth time just because you know I enjoy it.
I love laughing with you.
I love being with you.

I love you.

We dream of mountains,
but what they don’t tell you about mountains is that they are sometimes far away.
Sometimes our wandering feet lead us on different paths, chasing different summits.
Sometimes we climb different mountains.

But when trails do meet again, let us put our hands together and climb a new mountain.
Let us then stop and see the view for as long as we may.
And do nothing.
Together.

So now I’ve told you, and you know.

Let’s go play Frisbee.

28/8/26