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Rone Selim Jan 28
O’ country of my blood,
country of my ancestors
I long for you
Your luscious green landscapes
and your highest mountains
Your beautiful waterfalls
and your fountains
The sound of the neighborhood kids
laughing in the streets,
I long for you

A time where we ran outdoors so excited
we forgot to put our shoes on,
sitting on the front porch buying watermelon from the fruit-cart man,
then sharing it with our friends,
I long for you

Wherever I go I belong to you, one day shall my ashes be scattered and soil with you.
Being displaced as a child and not being able to experience the life lived in my birthplace and homeland.. these are some of the memories I got to experience while my first and last short visit after moving away. 5 years apart.
Now 22 years since the visit.

And 27 years living here as an “outsider” - however I would still be considered as an “outsider” in my homeland too.
Khadijat Bello May 2023
First, let me start by Greeting you in Twi, "memawo akye" in Kumasi
And back to my home land, I say to you, "Yene"! in Ebira
"Habri za asubuhi"! from Swahill
Ina kwana in Hausa
Emesiere! in Ibibibo
ụtụtụ ọma! in Igbo
Africa, the home of one third of the world's languages
Here I am telling you Djam walli!  in Fulfulde
Nigeria is a power house of over 500 languages
I say Kube lazhin! Nupe
U nder vee! in Tiv
Manao ahoana! in Malagasy language
Ojobe in Boki
Africa! My home continent, where some languages are foreign to most.
West Africa, my land region the Zone of the Giant of Africa.
Nigeria, my Father land! I say to you Good morning in different dialect.
Telling my own Africa story by Greeting you all Good Morning in different African dialects.
DeVaughn Station Mar 2021
I am from a dreamland.
My great land was diverse yet so grand as
the food and words were never bland.
The hands were rich with bands and rands,
built from working the same ground upon which we stand.
I am from a home that once spanned
prosperity itself; such a lovely
thing was a gift to our health. The sands,
skies, and seas could even hold the Heavens.
The trees used to dance in the breeze with ease.
I am from a dwelling of past envy,
but not of a hating feeling,
in the purest form, this was just only beauty.
But I am from broken societies.

Our hearts were bled dry
as we were taken overseas.
We prayed, begged, cried why
ever so loudly, but it was in vain.
I am from a place where our veins
still course with a saddened passion,
as a lack of love is our new fashion.

With sorrow, I am still from a life of death,
as their malice has never left.
Yet they still set us so carelessly upon the trees;
despite our screams and pleas, we
become the strangest fruits you have ever seen.
We have no identity and we have no names.
yet they still set us so harshly upon the pyre;
the painful extermination of desire
is a freedomless and killing fire.
Even our look for love is seen as theft,
and sadly, I am from where they even have my last breath.
Africa:
It is a lost place
One thinks of sunny
Blue skies
And then thunderstorms

Of running through
Vast, vast, vast
Open grasslands

Of cooking on a fire,
Of looking out
Over the hills of our
Homeland, homeland, home -
Land, land, land
William Marr Feb 2021
suffering from homesickness
he returns to his homeland
returning to his homeland
he suffers from homesickness

there’s nothing he can do about it
there’s nothing he can do about it
Flatfielder Jan 2021
Grown up between the waters
Bridge to Scandinavia

Looked west over the dikes
The lost lands to the sea

Went East to the cliffs
The Russian winds do blow

Back to the middle
Where the gales
Sweep the dirts soul
Once home
Man Jan 2021
woke up
with the sound
of jet engines
thundering, overhead
streaming the sky
brush strokes on high
of red and black

jumped at
straight back
from the bomb
they dropped
square in my living room

walking away
another day
i'll be back
when dust settles
amidst no attacks
on the sandy soil
of my
homeland
How do we define a peace land?
And where is the home, craving to return?
Listen, what did the birds and trees say?

The true pleasures lie beneath the mountain
A single bound will take us there
It is our first homeland where we were born free.

Seagull migrates well,
Pine tree wouldn't move
Look, they reunion in one home garden

They imagine that all their 
Woes, hurts and indignities
Would not exist
in their imagined homeland.

Where we learnt justice at our mother's knee
return is easy, we just have to dare
The true pleasures lie beneath the mountain

In their minds, homeland
is in stasis.
The life they left is lingering
waiting for them to return.
Dedicate to a double festival in China 2020-- Chinese national holiday as well as Mid-Autumn Festival
Mirza Lazim Sep 2020
My homeland!
You have been watching your crippled borders
with wistful looks for gloomy centuries
Soon we will wipe your bloodred tears
after heroic and holy adventures

Yet you are in a deep disappointment
because of the hands lent to the unscrupulous
But never unlearn the destiny ever:
history is always betrayed,
talents are envied,
virtues are misused...
They love politics, not the history,
'Cause they have a historical fear
and it reminds them how they had been abused...
I have found even their "sumptuous" justice
which is carried in their ***** bulky pockets...

My dear,
It is very near,
In Karabakh, the stars will twinkle in a joy
50 million times I will mention your name
and to Jıdır we will be running bare feet.
The echoes will fill the preconceived ears
In Shusha, I will call you,
In Tabriz, we will meet...
adamas Sep 2020
I am from inky cities,
From steaming street pancakes and cold noodles.
I am from lonely alleys beyond that dark turn.
(shadowy, quiet,
filled with whispers of cats wild and shabby)
I am from square, paint-dried courtyards,
A secret hideout to breathe in the murmurs of ancient trees,
Only shared with shadow thieves,
Whose yellow eyes glow and ***** tails curl.  

I am from the mountain beyond the choking greyness,
From the spot atop the hills where city lights could be seen
In stealthy nights through rain and frost.
I am from candied haws and stinky bean curds,
From chalky evenings
Spent high inside a climbing gym
Wearied, exhausted, inside-out.

I am from the toxic city,
Swarming with masked humans and silenced voices.
I’m from albuterol and Ipratropium bromide,
Sick from the cupboard of budesonide;
Saved again by the sky-blue machine feeding marshmallow clouds
Into my heavy, wheezy lungs.

Upon winter, I travelled far, said farewell to the city
Where ten years of memories lie dusted, submerged.
Thus I am from the serene seal cove and clear turquoise waters,
Where maple drips sweetly and pine needles rain,
From matted red-forest trails like a padded trampoline.
From the realm of black bears, red berries, and duck-duck-goose.

I said goodbye to the Chinese cats and Canadian bears,
And seized my pen to write the rest of my poem–
Because life, as they say,
“Is the art of drawing without an eraser”
After George Ella Lyon "Where I'm From"
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