Calvin,

Miami. I assume one day we’ll make it down there together and then on to Cuba and South America. Your description fits what I’ve imagined, two-bit celebrities and all. I leave in a few weeks for Switzerland, and I’m traveling light this time: three books for three weeks—Moby Dick, Leaves of Grass, Don Quixote. Call them pacifiers for my debilitating fear of flight. Call me soft or sentimental, or whatever.
    I might sit in on some lectures by Jean-Luc Nancy and Hélène Cixous and take in the Venice Biennale. I might go skiing in the Swiss Alps or skip over to Moscow or Berlin. I can’t be certain where I’ll end up on any given day or if I’ll be able to drop you a note.
    I was dreaming about visual poems the other night, the symbols were punctuated in a way that imparted some strange feeling and then you popped up, or your spirit, the time you met that guy who was present at the murder of Jaco Pastorius. Don’t ask me how it all worked. All I can think about is how I won’t see the city until I drive through the Blue Ridge and then on to Montreal at the end of the summer. In the meantime I feel like I’m waiting for next week’s weather report, watching Mannhattan’s skyline serve and Appalachia return.

as ever,

John

And a possible trip to Montreal

vaisseau spatial