Sitting in my living room,
I want to go home.
Home, to where I belong.
To the oaks that give me shelter,
To the pines that know me well.

I can write this poem in minutes,
Share it with my close ones,
Pour my pain onto the page.
But I can’t be home right now.

Embracing sunlit valleys,
Walking on moss in enchanted forests,
Talking to the land that knows.
The simple life that costs so much.

Between my birches I do roam,
Across green plains and forests,
Between my little, secret spaces
That I call home.

I wish my tribe were here,
But it is scattered,
Around the globe,
And nowhere near.

The longing will not cease -
So this is for my tribe,
A bird's song of my home
Where my soul finds peace.

There may have been other places
Where my heart fell in love.
But there is only one place
Where my heart, soul and mind connect.

Can only feel around the Lochs,
Can only think in endless glens,
Can only love sleeping on Munros.
Can only write when all connects.

My heart is broken,
My mind is craving,
My soul is crying
When I have to leave again.

Some day I will not leave,
I'll stay with the ones I love.
And when I die among the hills,
My ashes shall mingle with Caledonia.

tenderness and moon
go together
like you on I,
my ever
so daydream,
explorer of my
moonlit soul,
the celestial body
in which I rest
which is to say
you are home.
—
opening me up,
you found
a milky white lily,
a songbird and
forever
opening me up,
I was an open field,
the sky, rosy & romantic
and in it
lilies danced to
the concurrent
sound of birds, some
a sweet song
and the wind,
a soft scent,
a soft sensation,
my love letter
back to you.

i got woken up
before the sun could rise.
furniture scraped the floor
as the moving van arrived.

my father shed tears,
kissing the cats goodbye.
i was only seven
when their divorce
was finalised.

the next time
i was eight,
only six months
wiser than before.
my mother said
it was all a mistake —
we couldn’t live
like that anymore.

there were no cats
to bring back.
belongings were sold.
when we moved again,
we snuck out
during the day
so my father wouldn’t know.
it was better that way.

we lived hidden
in a half-house
under a tree,
as if the branches
could smother
the echoes
of the screams.

my brother returned,
shaping a new family
with a girl.
although a bit crowded,
for a moment,
i swear we were happy.

in between the bags
and the weight of living,
i jumped into
the arms of a boy
who gave me an out.
his smile felt like escape,
but left me empty
and dry.

a decade later,
i found a house —
not a house.
a home.
in a country
i was meant for.

they didn’t speak my tongue,
but accepted my love,
even the way i failed
and learnt.
the love was unconditional,
and asked for nothing
in return.

it took sixteen attempts
to find one i could own.
and now that it’s mine,
i never want to leave.

if i made a move,
it might stir the darkness —
the kind that still breathes.

sometimes.

and i need
to let it sleep.

I was thinking about the hornero bird today
how it builds its little house
Really, God gives it everything
just like that, for free
So why doesn’t He do the same for me?
Tell me where to find the clay
install in my mind
the coordinates
to build my home
and be
happy in it

O CAPTAIN! MY CAPTAIN!!

Walking under the moon, wishing for you,
In the still of the night, my heart beats for you.
You may be my house, a shelter so strong.
But I am your home, where you truly belong.

By Vedanta Anagha (Mayank Tripathi)

It’s 2022, we’re in the final battle for the soul of the world.
There is no Indo-European root for soul,
the Greek and Germanic roots mean quick-moving, fleeting, mercurial.
I’d add evanescent, impermanent, ephemeral
disappearing, diminishing, dwindling
tenuous, brief, short-lived.
Whatever forever—that’s where we’ll be after WWIII.

World, home, think, breathe: man,
woman the vital force in man, the Anthropocene, men together
violence, virtue, virility. Also, werewolf.
War: to confuse, mix up, make worse.
The old are paying close attention but my sons ignore the thunder,
plate tectonics, gamma ray bursters and mortars on the Eurasian front.
Peace out—the end, limit, boundary, never to have been. So long,
       sayonara, shalom, salaam. Take into eternity my hail and farewell.