13 June 2008 | Vol. 8, No. 2

some pages from the book of Brussels

by CECILIA BORROMEO-AUSTIN

p. 13

Suppose the night tasted like sugar and the streetlamps chimed the hour, would Flemish and French slang still matter? I was a little in love with you. The man scouring the Sunday market for vintage postcards. The child wailing after a drifting balloon. You made me forget how to count. But we danced flawlessly, our shadows spreading on the Belgian cobbles where tiny grasses grow in between.

p. 85

Do I mention the countless cheap umbrellas I'd lost? You'll find them as c