Leaving Porto Poem by Jan Oskar Hansen

It is six o´clock in the morning a woman is cleaning
the pavement outside a bank, and the café across
my hotel has just opened. I drink strong coffee and
eat a toast there. Only few people about except for
middle aged women on their way to a cleaning job
in an office or bank, work that has to be done so
before opening time. Not many cars about, they drive
drive with headlight on, which they must at all time
if they are new, but not needed if the car is old, which
a think is a rather eccentric law.

It is a beautiful morning, just warm enough to sit
outside and I inhale the heavenly aroma of cakes.
Soon I will take the bus home, but as for now I bear
witness to the birth of a new day in Porto.