A work by Clare Moloney
Clare Moloney
Ulica Dietla 11 F/3
Krakow 31-071
Poland
Dear Friend
On the train from Warsaw to Krakow a strange kind of paralysis set in. I didn’t, couldn’t move. I was frightened of making a mistake. Things improved after a cup of tea except I had lemon and not milk. It took five minutes for me to decide to rise and place the tea things on the rack above me just like the man opposite me.
I began at the tramway. Excuse me I am a foreigner, please recommend me where to go in Krakow? Oh Darling you should go straight, left, right and straight to the past in amongst the dead. And to a Renior, to a Cezanne, to a da Vinci. Walking we moved within the limits of my vocabulary. It is strange that the more I know the less freedom I have. Before I had multiple choices and now it is straight, left, right, left, straight. I can’t get lost.
Walk straight down Ulica Stradomska, turn right at the traffic lights. Walk straight across the road, continue straight across the road. Turn right and walk straight. Continue Straight. Ulica Dietla eleven, apartment three. Climb two flights of stairs. Number 3 is first on the left at the top of the second flight. The door has three locks. I enter the hallway dark. There is light spilling from Halina’s room and the noise of the television can be heard. She is, by her own admission, a ‘kino maniac.’ She may come out to greet me and ask I met any boys yet. I answer no and she looks disappointed.
Walk with me a while. Walking we are unseen until we break our pace and only then will we be discovered. I don’t really like Polish food. I eat guiltily at the nice vegetarian restaurant wondering if I am missing out on a less tastier but more authentic experience. Around the corner the temptation is always there to take shortcuts and traverse the familiar. I am still having milk in my tea which makes me wonder if I am any better than the two American boys I encountered. They wanted to see like an American film like…a new American film…like American Psycho. Have I left Home?
With kind regards
Text courtesy of Clare Moloney – all rights reserved
