On the Lawn of Ørstedsparken
At the top of the hill, a woman in her seventies sits on a bench reading a book. Her frame is slender but healthy, clad in a long blue and white gingham skirt and a white blouse that buttons up the middle all the way to her collar bone. Her posture is perfect, her legs are crossed, one foot planted on the earth, the other foot dangling in the air, but she bends it down every few minutes to tap one toe onto the ground. Her eyes move across each page in a way that is both stern and gentle, as one who takes life earnestly and, therefore, whose life has a certain delineated significance. Around her is an air of elegance, like an orb, that I’ve not yet seen in Denmark.
On the 3rd Floor of Paludan Bøgcafe
Three people walked upstairs about a half hour ago. A young woman carrying a baby and an older couple. The man disappeared downstairs soon after they arrived. The young mother laid her child on the carpeted floor, then crouched beneath the table to sit beside the baby. The older woman remained standing in front of her chair, looking around with a wobbly set of eyes that responded to a passing fly as if it were an old friend. Joy leapt into them as a smile filled up her face and her head went nodding in all different directions. Then, as suddenly as she’d become animated, she faded into herself for a while before bursting open again, this time at a small bookshelf she noticed on the wall behind her. The man has just returned with two tall dessert coffees, each piled high with two inches of whipped cream. While the mother on the floor continues pandering to her fussy child, the man and woman sit over their drinks, spoons and faces moving in and out, completely unaware of a surrounding world. Next to them, though, four people with erudite appearances are having a quiet conversation. I am here too, taking a break from my book to scribble these words into my journal. The walls around us are lined with Denmark’s most cherished philosophers, spiritual testaments and historical moments. But right in the middle of the room, underneath a small chandelier, is the fervent clanking of metal against glass and two faces covered in sweet white cream.
