Finding Home

Do we have to be away
to find home?

Not the mortgaged
two cars in the driveway
double-income kind of dwelling

I’m talking peace
in the heart, comfort
in the soul, blessed home

I have felt Presence
in nature, witnessed Spirit
in a newborn’s eyes

beheld reverence in a dying
sister’s final breath – fleeting
glimpses, nothing solid

I seek an eternal sense
of belonging, of atonement
to radiate a knowing, holy calm

Don’t speak to me of books
or passages, or a brother
with the voice of God

The home I seek is
an inner sanctum
a whisper, a cry

a longing answered
only in moments of pure
simplicity, in stillness

this noise we create
this distancing, is only fear
and forgetting: products

of original separation
a projection of abandonment
remembering, experiencing

the numinous, the sacred other
brings me back home
and I am no longer lost.

(Finding Home was first published here in February of 2017. I resubmit an edited version for Reena’s Xploration challenge: sacred space. Image my own.)

Published by

VJ

Permission to write, paint, and imagine are the gifts I gave myself when chronic illness hit - a fair exchange: being for doing. Relevance is an attitude. Humour essential.

85 thoughts on “Finding Home”

  1. “The home I seek is an inner sanctum…”, eloquently expressed. I love the last two lines that close the poem so very beautifully. Thank you for reading, VJ!

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    1. Thank you. Your blog is quite visually appealing. Good luck with your efforts. It takes time to find your voice and establish a following. Commenting on other’s blog posts is a good way to start. Most people will visit your blog without you asking.

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      2. I think WordPress offers tutorials to help. I’m not the best to ask, lol. I started the blog as a sort of diary for myself so wasn’t worried about followers. It took me a long time to figure out tags and categories, and even that I had followers.

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      4. You are welcome. Be patient. A couple of things I can tell you. Categories and tags help. Also, try to keep your posts short and to the point. Posting too much in one day will put people off, but posting consistently helps builds a following.

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  16. This is lovely, I really like the very personal touch with the voice recording. It is a very beautiful poem and heart warming, I felt the importance and heard every word. Thank you for a lovely poem

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  17. The poem is absolutely beautiful, I had chills by the end. “And I am no longer lost.” Hope I can feel like that someday too.
    The way you said it (recited it?) I’m hazy on the wording to use but that was so good too! I’ve been wanting to read out loud what I write for a while but I don’t think I’d be much good. You’ve inspired me enough for me to do a meek trial version though, so thank you.

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    1. Thank you so much for taking time to listen. Poems are meant to be spoken aloud, don’t you think? My voice is aged and cracked, but I just felt this poem needed it. My only advice is leave the volume up, lol. Nice to meet you btw.

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  22. I loved this, and agree wholeheartedly with the kind of home you are seeking, and I believe we all are really. Have you read Derek Walcott’s poem Love After Love? It speaks to me that true kind of homecoming–to ourselves.

    I like what you say about that original separation too, in Biblical terms The Fall, in psychology when the newborn separates it’s sense of oneness with its surroundings to identifying with a separate self. I like to think that we are all on a journey back to that original sense on Oneness, which we can’t really appreciate until we’ve taken that journey. Robert Hass calls it “some tragic falling off from a first world of undivided light” in his poem “Meditation at Laganitas.” Life is a marvel, isn’t it?

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    1. Thanks for your thoughtful response Deborah. Walcott’s poem says it much more eloquently than I do, but the idea is the same. Glad you could reference the original separation. Life is a marvel.

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  32. This is an exquisite poem about our need for “home,” beautifully crafted. Your reading of it made it all the more special. Thank you for this gift on the last day of my work week.

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