Bremen

Each trip to see some small part of the world
is a surprise, not in what is expected
that's always well enough researched
One knows Amsterdam before ever going
Is charmed, beguiled, whisked along
in a state of rapture
But seldom surprised

It's the unexpected that's the wonder for me
On my way from known Berlin
my mind full of anticipated canals
impatient with Bremen in my way
A dirty, bustling port city no doubt
Merely a blister on the map of Germany
stealing time on the road

It's old city center, six centuries of it
flower marketed and vegetable stalled
nooked and crannied with a human scale
upon which architecture long has turned its back
holds me there, brings me back
begs me stay an extra day
And so I do, taking the luxury simply offered

The old central winding park steals away my afternoon
taken deftly by gabbled ducks and dappled shade
feeling I was born here, lived some other life
among these homes I know and don't know why
This for me is the charm of travel, its pull
to the liveable unknown, caught unaware
in a place I would have spent a life