Get all 5 Eric Pan releases available on Bandcamp and save 25%.
Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Travel Poems . Chapter 3 . There is no path back, Travel Poems . Chapter 2 . The night sea, Travel Poems . Chapter 1 . Secret towns, The Awakening (Live), and Lullabies of the Pleiades.
1. |
Gare du Nord
02:57
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Claire, I’m writing you from a train station in Paris, which is less a place to be, than a total displacement. For 3 days it’s been raining over us, a constant mist that soaks my head immediately upon peeking outside. So I stay in, looking out, confined by my own feet. It’s my exterminating angel. I feel lonely and extinguished.
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2. |
Periscope Forest
01:29
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Claire, Taipei is glorious…it’s as though the people can just stay still and the food teems around us. I pop my head up above the crowd to see if a dessert cart might be coming around again. I’ll be ready next time. What a huge village. Everywhere must be fun because either teenagers or workers are laughing. Under the veneer I can tell we’re all meerkats.
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3. |
Discovery after Dark
03:19
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Claire, I met someone. She talks nonstop, and interrupts me all the time, just the way you do. I love it. We met on an overnight train to D.C. and immediately started chatting about why Camus thinks traveling reaches its fullest potential when we are acting from our fears. Nonsense, I think. So then she disagrees with me on everything, it’s such a thrill. I wish I could see the look on your face right now.
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4. |
Stranded Awake
02:49
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Claire. Have you ever felt so lost, even your sense of self is in question? I’m in an attic in the Haight. I’m running through a forest of thoughts and anxieties. But I don’t think they’re my own. You always talk about opening your heart & even your pores to the world…that’s the best way to get soaked by other people’s worries no? The ambient malaise just floating around. With this fog I can’t see what I’m supposed to do with my time here. Beam me a sign through your tropical sunglasses.
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5. |
Majesty of the Minute
05:55
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Claire, I think I’ve mastered time. If you want something to go by quickly, just snap your fingers. Now if you want something to go by slowly that’s harder, but it can be done too. I’m doing it right now. The evening is so pleasant here in Sedona, when the desert cools, and you just see the silhouettes of the saguaros. We all hold a pose sometimes. This specific dusk, I think it can last forever, if I allow it. By the time you read this, I’ll still be here.
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6. |
Foot of the Carpathians
05:45
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Claire, we have to attend the circus together sometime. I was wandering in Krakow, entirely aimless, when two fellow travelers welcomed me on their journey out of town. Come sunset, I’m surrounded by nomads making a caravan camp near the mountains, trying to sing songs in Ukrainian with them. Bonfire parties with guitar music transcend all cultural boundaries. It’s a vast country out here, and the universe continues its expansion.
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7. |
Up Jakupica
01:37
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Clairest, Hello from Solunska Glava, the sun has probably kept me lively for several days, I’m delirious with joy. My new favorite word is teleférique. Blanket me in bird feathers, I’ll sail straight to you on one continuous breeze. That’s how fortune-filled I feel. It’s so idyllic on these grassy peaks, each roaming animal more furry than the next. I’m convinced the ancient Macedonians basked like these stones and stored the heat in their bodies, humming all the while.
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8. |
Hamstrung
01:07
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Claire, the magic in this world, is it evenly spread? It could be hidden in easter eggs, or carefree like dandelions when scattered. I hope it looks after us from time to time. I’m in the cloudforest of Monteverde, nursing a heartbreak that should have been gone by now. I think it’s a burrower. It’s my secret companion no one knows about unless they cut me open and read my tree rings.
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9. |
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Claire, I think it’s wild that the feeling of home can change. It can become untethered from geography, it can become a person. It can even disappear completely. I think I’ve experienced all these variations. Can it be somewhere I’ve never even visited, except only in my mind? This is Phuket, Thailand, and nowhere. When I was a child I built a toy village, and would imagine becoming tiny and moving in with them. Can home be the whole world?
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10. |
Epilogue
00:44
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Eric Pan New York, New York
Imagine a universe where we’re connected by shimmering beams of light, everyone to
everyone.
One quirk about this universe is that the beams send emotions between us, one million per minute per pair, clearly & effortlessly.
Now imagine we already live in this universe except, long ago, we forgot where the beams went. But we’ve always kept music with us: it’s our best way to speak in the old way.
... more
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