Milano




So that's it – seven hundred miles and we're back. The more things change the more they stay the same.
The real world beckons although in some way, compared to the rest of Italy, in Milano it is already here.

Office blocks. Trams. Mobiles phones. Gucci. Rush, rush, rush. McDonald’s. Ralph Lauren. Status. Fashion. Success.

I have learned so much but soon the city will take me over and I will feel as empty as when I arrived.

Empty.

Empty.

Nothing


It doesn’t happen. I sit in the garden by the San Siro and I understand. I understand that I have a 'real world' self and a 'cycling' self and that these are very different things. The former is not real at all but is very good at pretending to be - at work, at home, in the pub - so much so in fact that it has become arrogant and self-righteous. It is not me. It is my self projecting itself on the world.
A few months ago it was all that I wanted to be. It had the success, it had the respect and it had the girl. Then it didn’t and so it came to Milan trying to find a new destination.

It didn't find it.

I return to the Gucci shops, the Duomo and the fountains and I find him just as I left him. Two weeks of the most beautiful experiences and no answer to give.

However, I have remembered something else. Through lakes and mountains and art and God, I have revisited my natural self and found that he is beautiful. I want to live in him.

I have to come back to Milano. The journey must end and I must go back to the real. What I have realised is that the real can be beautiful as well and maybe the real me can be too. I have seen the Birth of Venus, the Sistine Chapel, Florence and I have seen that they are real – crafted by real hands and real minds – beautiful hands and minds, and that this can exist in the world and can be part of your world too.
Sometimes you have to go back to remember.

Be with me.

Be beautiful.

Bellisimo

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

An Alliterative Alternative

Yes, that was the exercise. A poem with alliteration on every line written about love for an object. Very trying, but it did mean that I got to let out some more confessions about the concerning relationship between my bike and I. Love on Two Wheels - A Poem Clunk clunk clunk Shifts will shank and slip Click click click Barings bounce and break Squeaal. Squeaaal. Pads rasp on rim Scratch, scratch. Saddle scrapes my crotch Handles hammer hands Wheelarch rakes the thigh Pedals pummel my shin You’re unreliable as a rat Painful as a piercing You hurt and harangue me, You make my stomach sick Yet my bike, my beau I love you For all the hurt and the pain When we pedal the peaks, We speed and fly on the freeway You make me live and laugh; Clamour and acclaim. We journey, one organ, one person. We join together, cycle and soul We are welded Amalgamated A bond unbreakable That’s why you are more Than a painting or ...
Read more

Why I run fifty miles a week

'Why do you do it?' my friends ask me day after day. 'Why do you get out there and run every day? Don't you think you might be a bit of a masochist?' Little do they realise that in this one statement, they have touched upon exactly the reason why I run fifty miles a week through all fifty two weeks a year. I do it because it hurts. There are some very simple reasons why the pain that running causes can become a pleasurable feeling, in fact for many people the hurt is the very reason why they go out running in the first place. 'I want to get fit,' they say. 'I want to lose weight, I want to challenge myself.' They know that running is going to hurt, and in the back of their minds they want it to. In hurting running validates itself, it attains a purpose. As the steps get harder and the sweat begins to build, a constant reminder in your head says: 'I am getting stronger, I am getting fitter. I am losing the pounds off my arse.' Then as you star...
Read more

A Poetic Interlude

Hello all Its poetry time on the Creative Writing Course. I am dothing my beret and will go and sit in the nearest field, just when it stops raining and/or being freezing. So far it has proved a mixed bag. I have written a poem while listening to music (exercise 12.3) which went well, and i have written a poem about a cow (exercise 12.5), which was awful. I will share the former if you don't mind. The Lake The plain of your stomach Still and serene as a mountain lake I kiss the top of the water A ripple up your body A breath of air sounds above me Leaves rustle in recognition The waters lap against my face Warm and soft like the womb I want to dive in Submerge myself in blue syrup Fill my pores with your touch Mix my body with you You urge me down deeper Until i can see or feel no other The world is blue, is you I am blue. I am the water. So that was written while listening to Tender by Blur interestingly enough. Okay its not perfect, but its a start. Next assignment - a poem with...
Read more