Member-only story
Mr. Switzerland
a poem, or flash fiction, about a conference
I think of you often, Mr. Switzerland. How you spoke perfect English and were not deterred by my accent. The sadness in your voice when you said you bred cockatoos but only the white ones. Your claim that I had helped you find a taxi at that late hour, in the middle of the city, the country I’d never been to before when the truth is you most likely were an old hand at heralding taxis at midnight.
To my regret I immediately forgot your name, being swept away by visions of pristine streets and tourist worthy chocolates and postcards of snow glazed mountains.
Do you sometimes think of me, Mr. Switzerland, and wonder if I still steal ball point pens from foreign hotel clerks. Alas, there have been no more foreign hotel clerks since that night, Mr. Switzerland.
No one had ever called me mademoiselle before you, Mr. Switzerland, or since. Here at home I am the simple Ms or Hey You in everyday flat English, just another older woman at loose ends left untied. Here I travel across town with friends who never take taxis.
Oh, Mr. Switzerland, how I long to hear your soft voice again in the darkness
of the taxi, how I long to see you grin again past my table at breakfast, in that stream of ornithologists and learned professionals moving to the day’s…
