Return

Nostalgia is a river that doesn't flow backwards

I don’t know if

I will ever return

to my homeland.

I don’t know if I will

have rituals that console me.

I don’t know if one day

I will belong beyond

the support from mountain rock,

the whispers of the creeks,

the hug of the earth,

or the wind of the path...

My blood spills upon dust

that will never understand

my lack of absence.

I’m safeguarded

by a job well done,

a friend well met,

& an ocean that collapses

upon itself.

As I cry,

this cannibal world

holds my frontier,

and in the meantime,

I’m still here.