Expatriette in...

a sprig of rosemary is the most romantic thing about that particular kind of incident. the house was made out of wood and it was delicate, unlike any of the people who lived there, though, they, too, were made out of wood. people who are made out of wood don't have eyes. in our world, we'd say they are blind, but luckily their society knows better & not having eyes is seen as their gift. they are part of a scent tribe and inhabit a forest in grasse, france where clouds of lilac-colored smells hang light in the air. base notes are likened to familial lineage and top notes to individuality. they are warriors for nature and lovers and the strongest people to have ever lived. late at night, the wood people ether into perfume and float into the crevices of cracking bark to soak & write letters to old travelers. the now wind-weathered-people are lulled to sleep by the tales and the lores that cradle their little sheer bodies.

sometimes two wood people fall in love & they start to smell the same. often times a family is formed before they even realize they belong to each other. it's like the one legend of a man who brought her a sprig of rosemary & always, she'd find a use for it: eventually they did what the hopeless & the hopeful, the lonely & the lovely do & they grew into each other. they named their first born rosemarine. the first sentence she said out loud was something about the moon and how it was always out. most people, she noted, can only see it when it's dark enough, but we're lucky because we can always smell it and scents it. she wondered if the rest of us knew the constellation of stories that surround the moon as well as she knew them. "the light is piercing, but so is the sentiment. and i guess so are we." that's just how she was.

notes about portland:

terrible tim on the 8 told me ports and coin tosses on the west coast were enough and serenely erie. it was a boston and a gold rush to a could-have-been-boston in 1851. the two rivers crossed at a point known as "the clearing" & 800 people lived there and though they are historic, in some ways he thinks we're just as alike as anyone could be & he's probably right, as most terrible people are.