Barcelona
 
I dream, from time to time, of Barcelona.
When the lakes are frozen and the engines won’t turn over,
when no letters from friends inhabit the mailbox
and my own words stick in my teeth,
when I can’t sleep or I sleep too much,
then I summon visions of Barcelona.

I know people who’ve been to Barcelona.
They leave the prairie towns of Minnesota,
fly into the dawn, then land at golden evening
on an azure shore of the Mediterranean,
ready to dine on octopus and saffron.
Sometimes they bring me back a small, bright trinket.

I have never been to enchanting Barcelona,
nor seen clay mushrooms soar cathedral-wise
(inspired ambition eternally unfinished);
I cannot pronounce my name in Catalan.
But I can imagine walking those sun-baked streets,
glazed mosaics glinting with shattered logic,

realigning scattered pieces in new pictures,
reminding broken hearts of future beauty.
It is good to have a place I will never go,
like Oz but better, a thriving foreign city,
where real life unfolds serene without me.
Sé que encanta Barcelona. Barcelona me encantó.

Leslie Schultz

(Image of Barcelonain mosaic from photo in the public domain)

Check out other participants at the NaPoWriMo Challenge 2017 home site!