I woke up before anybody else. Like a sleepwalker, I prepared my backpack before fully realizing what I was doing. I took a few sips of hot coffee and I went out in the cold air.

Past my neighborhood, with its smell of freshly-baked bread and its familiar streets that I can recreate in full detail

Past the railway station, which always smells of creosote and farewells and never-coming-backs

Past the forest, where I’ve lived my joys and drowned my sorrows and watched the sun go up and go down

Past the river, where so many have drowned trying to get somewhere or running away from somewhere

Past the mountains, with their dark valleys and shining peaks and secret caves and passages

Like the tiny forest spring flowing into the river that flows into the river that flows into the river

Eventually finding its way to the ocean

I keep on moving