A poem written in 2018. A dream brought to life in 2026.
I wrote this poem in 2018, before I had ever set foot in Paris.
But I had already lived there a thousand times.
I had walked its streets in my imagination, fallen in love beneath its bridges, argued with philosophers in its cafés, and watched revolutions unfold in its squares.
For years, I had immersed myself in the French Revolution and the ideals of the Enlightenment. I was enchanted by French cinema, literature, music, art, cuisine, and that extraordinary French insistence that life should not merely be lived, but experienced, questioned, tasted, and loved.
Paris became my beautiful obsession.
But somewhere along the way, I discovered something far more fascinating than Paris itself.
It was not Paris I was trying to understand. It was the part of me that needed Paris to exist.
What is it within us that takes a city of stone and water, of streets and strangers, and transforms it into the geography of our deepest desires?
Why do we place our longing for love beneath its bridges, our hunger for freedom in its squares, our dreams of beauty in its windows?
Perhaps the Paris we dream of reveals more about the dreamer than the city.
Perhaps we do not travel to Paris to discover Paris.
We travel there to meet the person we have always wanted to become.
A person who believes that love can still be innocent, that beauty can still save something within us, that freedom is worth fighting for, and that life, despite everything, remains an extraordinary invitation.
And perhaps we need a place like Paris because the world so rarely resembles the world our souls insist should exist.
That is how Je Veux was born.
I want.
Two simple words. An entire philosophy.
I want joy. I want peace. I want justice. I want compassion. I want to read, to write, to dream, to dance, to love, to escape.
I want Paris.
But beneath all those desires lies a deeper revelation:
We are, in so many ways, the sum of our longings.
Our desires are not merely things we hope to possess. They are the unfinished portraits of who we are.
What we want reveals what we value. What we dream reveals what we lack. And what we refuse to stop dreaming reveals what remains alive within us.
Eight years later, with the help of technology, I have finally given this poem a voice, a melody, and a moving picture.
I wanted the music to carry the same longing that gave birth to the words: something romantic yet restless, intimate yet boundless, nostalgic yet reaching toward tomorrow.
And now, a dream that once existed only on a page can sing.
Perhaps that, too, is a little revolution.
I leave you with Je Veux, not simply as a song about Paris, but as an invitation to discover your own Paris, wherever it may be.
Because somewhere inside each of us, there is a city we have never visited, a love we have never known, and a life we have not yet dared to live.
And perhaps the most beautiful thing about being human is that we never stop wanting to get there.
Enjoy.
Wissam Charafeddine
