Geborgenheit*

Crisp fall air & skies tinted with gray
Greet me on a lazy Sunday morning
Reminding me that I’m in a land many miles from home
But feeling more at home than I’ve ever felt,
I wonder how it’s possible to be so enamored with a place that barely knows me

A city that does not overwhelm the senses
Heightening the gravity of its presence with every turn
Marked by the smells of warm apfel strudel and brezen wafting into the streets
Glass steins gleefully clashing against one another, brimming with liquid joy
Surfers crashing against the waves of a serene English garden
Lovers lying blissfully by the flowing river
Endless greenery joined together by young & old souls alike
A contained paradise of the senses

Its buildings are intricately molded with beauty
Cracked with the weight of history from within
Each inch reflects the most defining parts of our world
A collection of lessons
Managing to both thrill with the glow of possibility
And humble us to the most hallowing core
Apologetic for the enormity of its past
Hopeful for its present – growing for its future
A constant revelation of the best & worst of us

But what draws me the most this place
Are the people that it draws into itself
Each aching to find connection with something here
And realizing that the most beautiful connection lies not in the concrete;
But in the others like ourselves.
A mixed bag of accents, cultures, experiences
Joining together to make this place that is not ours
Into something that is.

A home that was not given -but created.
mit Liebe

*A feeling of security