Once I Dreamt of Speaking French

It’s the pleated accordion who reminds me mid­fall
of dreams passed: scrawny six­track Nick, he
who presses out waltzes so sweetly on the keys as happy
hands heave the bellows. I ask him to play his favorite,
from Amelie? I think of an old friend’s favorite and
reckon a butchered guess. Comptine d’une autre été;
The vestigial accent lies unpracticed on my tongue,
its dormant nature painfully obvious in the way my
mouth adamantly refuses to properly contort into the
nuanced sounds of autre. Each throaty r lost in
translation an alternate station gate closed, another
help wanted unanswered, a feeling never to be repaid.
(It belonged to an old friend, returned with the DVDs
in a box. Monty Python smelled too much like Pantene,
a dry smile, the feeling only an unintended side-effect
of the corollary.)

It’s not regret, it’s loneliness. Perhaps the same thing.









Sophia Zhang is a student from Mountain View, California. She is an aspiring writer acquiredwine.wordpress.com and enjoys analog photography sodapopfia.myportfolio.com and desperately wishes to be funny. If she ever gets published or exhibited anywhere, you can find updates on her Instagram page @fiachanel.