I am of a diaspora
Born onto foreign soil
How to find the way home
Across an ocean
Tracing my lines through
The helix of data in my bones
Where could I be assimilated
Which place would I be welcomed
From the mountains or the highlands
Or the ocean or the field
Separated from my ancestors
Right of return for me
Returned by right
Where where
In the Caucasus mountains
Would I be Ireland bound
Would Finland take me back
Stamped return to base
Where where in the world
Are there others like me
Made of magic
Made of light
Made of suffering
Made of plight
Will I dwell here forever
Die here then as well
Well would I put my roots
Deep into the earth who sheltered me
Raising my hands to the blistering sky
Praying for rain and rain and love
Be home to me, earth
Nestle me close within your caverns
Stone walls and soft mud
I cannot go back to a place unknown
How would I find my way
Throw me into the ocean
Until I am eaten or tossed onto the sandy shores
Bash me into rocks
Drown me in the depths
Bury me in the saltwater until I rise with stars
There is no place for me among the living
And the dead are not yet ready
I lie here on a forest floor and decompose
All the pieces laid out and counted
An audit of spirit an accounting
There’s love and greed and hate and envy and compassion
There’s impatience and intolerance and jaded hopes and faded dreams
There’s gratitude and shelter and tenderness and need
Count them one by one by one by one
Sheltered by the leaves
The tree roots pull me deeper into the earth
They light the fire within this hearth
Too damp to burn brightly the hot wind blows and blows
The heat is cloistered around me drying me
I am split
Just last years wood thrown and neatly stacked
Until yes that is a spark
And yes that is a flame
And yes this is me coming home
And no I never have and never will belong to anything or anyone
The way I find my home here in the dirt
The way I make my path across the sky
The way I grow just like the trees
The way I run feral and wild within the forest
My padded paws and clutching claws climb mountains
Just for fun
I am hunting truths and snarling at the wrongs
I run and run and run
Completely free
The lies are swept away in the fire and the flame
Where earth and wood and star conjectured
I am conjured magic
I am blinding light
I am gone in a flash
In the deepest night
Make your wish on me
Then I am not and naught
