Journey to Copenhagen

Pedestrian street in Copenhagen

Just yesterday, I learned of  a worldwide poetry event: "On the 21st of March, World Poetry Day, the National Poet of Belgium, Els Moors, invites all people worldwide to gather their most beautiful odes and elegies on their cities (/ countries / states / …) and make them public. In times of gentrification, mass tourism and worldwide migration we are craving for lonely flâneurs and notorious wanderers who want to lay bare the mysterious heart of their cities. Are you still in love with the city you were born in? Were you pushed on by love, or obliged to leave your hearth and home? Adopt your city by writing an urban elegy and take part in the writing of the most exotic Lonely Planet: The adopted cities."

You can go to their website at http://www.dichterdesvaderlands.be/nieuws/the-adopted-cities/ to enter your own poem about your own city, or your adopted city.

I decided to do a poem about my visit to Copenhagen, Denmark 35 years ago. I was fascinated by the city, but never wrote about it until yesterday when I heard about the National Poet of Belgium's invitation.

Journey to Copenhagen

Copenhagen.

The far point of my travels that summer.

Riding the train north from sunny Italy,

That last stretch through the night

As we entered Denmark

Chilled me to the bone.

Once acclimated to the northern clime

The grand city won my heart.

Solid and settled

With ancient memories –

Wholesome, strong and pagan –

And civilized.

It’s what people eventually do

When they get the routine down

Of living together

To enjoy the fruits of their labors.

I plotted out my course through the city.

Such wonderful fountains – especially that mighty bull

    with dramatic prays of water coming from his nostrils!

Elegant  dining,

Old buildings,

Stately churches,

And half-clad women in the park

Who were more acclimated to the weather than I.

A tour guide told us

Of the glorious palace,

How it burned down twice

Before its present majestic state.

He told how the crown

Brings in wealth from exports

Because no one else in the world

Knows how to make beer like the Danes.

The old world gaiety

Of Tivoli Gardens

With men singing in beer halls,

Hurdy-gurdy music down the street,

And vendors selling ice cream in fresh-made waffle cones.

I parted from the crowds

And made my way to the cemetery

Where I sat by Kierkegaard’s grave.

Under the old oak tree

Sitting on a cement bench

I read Philosophical Fragments

And recalled the commonality of tears

That connected us

And brought me to this far point

In my travels.

                                                          ~ CK

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Photo Credits

Upper: "Strøget" - The Pedestrian Street in Copenhagen in the old Medieval part of the city
            From Copenhagen Portal.dk

Lower: The Gefion Fountain against background of St. Alban's Church. Copenhagen, Denmark,                       Northern Europe
             Credit: Mstyslav Chernov
             Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons



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