Motherland

＂＂＂＂＂＂Home is not a physical place that we can carry ourselves back to. Home is a state, sometimes robbed from us in childhood. A state we spend our adult lives attempting to repair. We look for it in lovers who become mirrors for our loss. Sometimes, we become convinced that no earthly home exists for us. Ultimately, home is a place we must build within ourselves, from the rubble of our failings. By looking into the mirror, into the abyss and by staying determined to accept, to understand, to love. By watering both the flowers and the weeds growing in our gardens. And for some of us most fortunate, there is a glorious and protected pocket of home contained within the living beings from whom we gained our life force. A place that we come to be reminded of who we are, if it is ever forgotten. For those of us, home is where your mother is. These poems explore the brutal and beautiful journey of becoming the safe space that you so desperately crave.＂＂＂＂＂＂