Ode to that little bridge in the Dutch light

Photo by Dewang Gupta on Unsplash

Tonight the light looks like you. 

I remember because it was the first time we met on that bridge in that park in Rotterdam.

What was the name?

I can’t remember.

I can still see your face in that famous sinking Dutch light.

It changes the color of everything.

That light.

Draped around you like the cape of the Scarlet Pimperenel as you talked about your Rugby days with the nostalgia of an old man looking back on his life at the end of his days.

You smelled like cigarettes and Terre d’Hermes mixed with the briney, dark waters of the Rotterdam Harbor.

The fading sunlight on that little bridge in the park I can’t remember changed your face.

The warmly intense Dutch light magnified your geometric jaw softened by one insistent dimple sitting proudly where it needed to be.

I remember because you leaned in to whisper in my ear.

I could see the Dutch light settling between our faces, dividing you from me.

So close.

The light dimmed a little.

It downshifted into a more serious shade of orange and purple.

You kept leaning closer, but you weren’t talking about Rugby anymore.

You were inaudible.

I could see your mouth moving, your lips glistening from the light, but I don’t remember what you were saying.

I watched the light grab your words and bounce them into the coming dusk.

That mischievous low Dutch sun dimmed itself without warning, revealing your face in mesmerizing high definition

You whispered, come walk with me.

The words lingered.

I think I flushed and blushed.

I’m sure my bosom heaved.

Suspended by the last rays of light, I reached out to touch those words as they drifted between us, but they floated onto a sinking sunbeam.

I could see your face smiling back at me, dimples in full dimple mode.

As you took my hand to walk over that little bridge in the park I can’t remember in Rotterdam, I turned to see the last of the Dutch light from the sun take a bow.

On its last rays, we walked into the starry night.

Tonight, the light looks like you.