Look out the Window

A look through my window shows a dark sky with a few blue spots in between. It really seems as if an ugly camoflage of grey was the pattern of the sky, and blue-coloured clouds were moving here and there, driven by the wind. In the distance, some two hundred metres away, I see a church tower with a clock that I can only read when I narrow my eyebrows and squint.

I'm on the third floor and my window looks over a number of rooftops that only few people can see. The buildings are partly residential and partly occupied by shops. It's the pedestrian precinct and I doubt that most people on ground level, who have strolled through those streets the better parts of their lives, ever take time to look above the store fronts and regard the houses.

A few weeks ago, just after I had arrived here, I went to an academical event in Bonn. An overly motivated lady talked about sijo-poetry from the sixteenth century and some of their most prominent themes. Doors, she said, could be opened from both sides and access was granted, whereas windows merely allowed people inside to look out. Look out and see what they can't reach.