Dawn

Jet lagged.
I can't seem to beat it. It is four am and I am awake as if it were noon. That makes no sense, it should be ten pm for my brain, but it isn't. A few more days, I think to myself, stalking around the attic rooms. Few more days before I finally click into European mode. For now, everything is fine at four, and I am ready to die by lunch time. This is for the birds, this half-life.
On the upside, there is this.

Half an hour from the Paris, and it's like being immersed in England. The birds own the streets at this time of morning, between the trucks and the trains. They sit on the fat power lines and pour noise into the cool blue air. Among others, I hear blackbirds. I had missed their sound. Not that there's anything wrong with Cardinals and warblers, but this is different, older, like a remembered heartsong.
 It's beautiful.