MONTPELLIER Poem by Elly de Waard

The shimmering city;
down in the shade of trees
rustling the sycamore leaves

are set in motion by a
sudden cooling gust of wind -
then once again are still

and around my ankles
some have settled.
Expansive, this, so balmy

and so unlike the timid
settlement, where I
was shut up in my thoughts

because of the closeness
and definability
of every sound; but here

in the open space
of a city with distant
and uninterrupted traffic

that mutes itself in its own flow
and equalizes
all other sounds, I can let my thoughts

go like a herd
and let them graze
on the scale, the breath

of what is urban, while I myself
scattered, guarding them, sit
on the esplanade

absorbed in this peaceful size
my feet, planted as they are
in the leaf of the sycamore tree.