On some days I grasp the soil that dresses
the bed where my father’s bones have long slept
Tiny doors I knock on
Begging for a minute of comfort
An embrace, a word, a guide
I pour jugs of my emptiness through the spaces between the earth’s grains
but his ears have long hardened
On other days I long
to crawl back into Mother’s gentle womb
where the walls are safe and
the waters bind my heart with nourishment
and leave my burdens on her knowing shoulders
but the years have left her frail
her head grey, her heart strained
and the womb a home I’ve outgrown
So I keep my days as they are
longing and lone
swallowed into a hard hole
where my heart’s salvation’s no more
The Book Neighbourhood 