My City by Maria-Ana Necula
October 6, 2020






Here is a stirring and evocative poem that makes my heart sing with longing for my native Bucharest ~ the city that seduces you and haunts your memories long after you leave it, luring you back to it again and again, the city of my childhood, the city of my heart, that undefinable blend of chemical reactions of Parisian-Latin-Ottoman(ish)-Slavic elements on steady Dacian hearts and progressive Roman spirits. Sublime, cunning, self-indulgent, adaptable, ironic, beautiful and ugly, savage and elegant, sophisticated and primitive, and always true to its unique Romanian-ness.
My City
By Maria-Ana Necula
A city in the middle of a vast plain,
A crossroads of centuries of history,
An ebullient city
Growing and claiming
Its right to European civilization.
This was my city.
Modern and ancient,
Vibrant and lazy,
Anchored in two worlds,
East and West,
Handling ambiguity with grace and innovation,
Lucid and sentimental,
This was my city.
The morning strolls
Under the bluest of the blue skies
In the pure light
Of an early June day
Were like making peace
With mankind.
Flooded by light in the summer days,
Covered by snow
On harsh winter days,
My city is a river running through history.
I do not fully recognize it today,
But I am so grateful
That I lived at a meander
Where a less frantic world
Allowed this city
To peacefully float on the Danube plain.
Bucharest. My home.
September 30, 2020
Images of Bucharest (top to bottom) 1. University Square, 2. the Arch of Triumph, 3. Victory Avenue (Calea Victoriei), 4. the river Dâmbovița, 5. the pedestrian zone and famous restaurant Caru' cu bere (the Beer Cart) opened in 1899 in the Old Town, 6. the Macca-Villacrosse Passage.