In The End All You Want Is To Go Home

in the end all you want is to go home

reading the book you read to find 

you have arrived home on the last page

singing the song on the final note you feel

if I hold onto the last note for as long as I do that

on the arc of my breath, for that duration

I will be home

you do your best and the note lingers

it is prolonged, the wave of the music

will come again: yellow tangle of light shining bright at night

silkscreened,

the house like the moon's causeway...

everything forces you out in the beginning

if you could you would pack all the gardens

the bluebirds and the roots of trees

the lamp posts as they used to be

the little twilights when what was pink turned blue;

even the storm clouds

how did you do it you wonder later

did you tell yourself I'll be back soon

did you think the moon would go with you

so I'll be ok, the blossoming lime

so you go, you take the steps necessary

but you never leave

to leave home as it exists inside you

would be to have no soul left

at all

no place to meet God

the flower leaving the sod.

the stars leaving the sky.

the ship on land.

who could stand it.

mary angela douglas 26 january 2022