The Kiss

Aaah… Can you hear it? Shh! Can you hear it? No? Stand next to me and give me your hand. Close your eyes. Hey, don’t cheat! Close your eyes. Listen. Can you hear the wrestling waves of the Curonian Lagoon? Can you hear the clouds drifting in the sky? And the ship’s captain asking passengers to come to the deck? Listen to the leaves rustling on the other side. Ah, it’s nice here. Just close your eyes, become one with nature and the whole bustling port city seems to disappear behind you. All the pedestrians and cyclists rushing to the ferry seem to stop, and the grey gulls no longer lurk in the waters for their prey.

Now quietly and very slowly open one eye a little, just don’t give yourself away! Open one eye… You see a boy there, on the other side of the Danė? The one with a hat and a puppy! He’s wonderful, isn’t he? He waves to the arriving ships and sees off the departing ones with his childish innocence. Aaah… I want so much for him to finally notice me… I’ve been standing here since 2014, and he still hasn’t looked at me. I was put here by a sculptor from Vilnius, Romualdas Kvintas, and I haven’t moved an inch since. Actually, I did hide for a while a few times. It was interesting to watch how quickly the people of Klaipėda would start looking for me. And I can’t help but think – did he miss me? I keep dreaming that he turns around, looks into my eyes and runs to me. I wonder what he would say. Would he speak at all? Maybe we would just stand there, drowning in each other’s eyes? Oh, how I would like to tell him. How much I’ve seen here in such a long time, how many ships I’ve seen, how many people I’ve met, how long I’ve been waiting for him.

Hey! Could you take my message to him? Take my love letter to him… Please, write him that I’ll be waiting for him at the Smiltynė ferry when the red dusk covers the port city. Please take my message to him and hide it under a stone so that no one takes it.

And I’ll be waiting here.

I’ll love him.

I’ll hope.

And I’ll wait.