Home

I wonder if those who know home
as a place will ever know the full meaning
of the word.

Houses, I've had many -
tile floors or carpets,
air conditioning or heaters,
duvets or body pillows -
all just material things shed
with each move,
which is why I've gotten so good
at ridding myself of excess.

Nothing follows me
if I don't want it to.

I came to think that home
was as changeable as seasons or years,
that the world in itself could be a home,
that anywhere is a home and will be a home
so long as I lived in it.

Now I know better;
because even without a house to call home,
homesickness, that little annoying tug
of longing on the heart
is real.

It took me awhile to know,
twenty-or-so years to see
that home is not a place.
Home is a space of feeling cared for,
loved, and smiled at,
it's the two-second warmth of hugs
and the just-so calling of your name,
it's the table where there will be a chair for you,
it's the two-minute goodbye that stretches to ten
because you just need every extra second,
and the promise that distance will not brush away
fondness or thought in the well-wished space
between people.

And so I have hoped to build homes
in the hearts of those who will give me space,
just a little room, all I ask,
where I will always be welcome.