Sergels Torg, Stockholm

In the dark night rounding the corner
of Drottningatan,
the central town square lit up,

all of a sudden I look up and see
a man, walking a tight rope
between two buildings, me on my way home
walking

God that city, the way I walked the
narrow streets
like sparrows,
poking in and out

but it’s already below zero
and I watch the French man cross that tight rope in
half- moon slippers,
and other passers-by stop to watch too

All the people of Centralen:
groups of men
speaking Arabic, their
bird-flying hands and
white sneakers,
the alcoholics
with loud voices and
big red noses and
suburban kids,
with no place better to be in this

crystal glass night.
The hollow bell of the cold and the
thousand lost hearts,
under down coats and
fur-lined hoods,
in walking boots,
walking,
stopped,
for a moment,
looking up,
into this beaming night.

But the cold makes the night so thin your body slips right into it,
and all at once you are

the black silk night,
you are
the tinker-tin stars

your wide-eyed
moon- eye
illuminating

these people
of the dark,
this night below

By Elissa Calamia

Biography:

Elissa Calamia currently lives and works in Austin, TX with her boyfriend and Dalmation. She is grateful of the cities in which she has called home, which continue to shape the lens of her world.