This one has been almost a whole year in the making (location/space/place ring a bell?), but today was the first day I tried to put it all together. It also still needs a title. All suggestions/criticisms welcome.
Ahh, home, let me come home
Home is whenever I’m with you
Ahh, home, let me come home
Home is when I’m alone with you
- Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros
Kindergartners discuss the word “home”
as a concrete object: a noun with one definition.
Names and numbers are recited,
shaky hands draw pictures with firm boundaries.
Home is what’s then hung on the refrigerator,
a stable place of safety.
Over time, that concept broadens - as many do -
from a simple shelter to a complex abstraction
full of ambiguity and desire
as the search for familiarity begins.
What makes the picture complete?
A certain color carpet or style of chandelier,
furniture swiped from garage or basement,
or windows that gaze onto a landscape full of possibility?
“Home” now demands more than materials –
more than the predictable pattern of potholes
leading back from the grocery store,
more than the drone of ceiling fans
or a collection of comforting objects.
That esteemed title is reserved for moments –
wrapped in the span of broad shoulders,
surrounded by the sound of dueling heartbeats,
indifferent to location beyond arms’ reach.
The details will fall into a particular place
which may be carved out in Crayola years from now,
but for now, the search is over.
April 9, 2011
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