I am homesick for a place I have never been,
a place I have never seen.
Yet, as I wander on the thin map of my life,
there are places where home finds me,
there are ways I make it home.
I remember a table at Stone Oven -
the old Stone Oven -
a pad of paper, a smooth pen,
her whole self listening.
I remember a song sung in a simple church.
A man, a guitar, three hundred
eyes looking at me as I spoke from
the second beat of my heart,
the one that pushes out truth.
I remember the first time
I kissed her in the spring outside.
Her lips warm, her face warm,
her smell like the garden she was planting.
I remember a day in the pouring rain,
I remember a toddler wobbling toward me,
I remember a bridge over a small creek.
I remember a catch, a car, a star dotted sky.
I remember six women appearing to circle the bed,
I remember the last tear I saw on my mother's face.
I do not have your silent husband,
I will never have your daughter, your grown son,
your baby Maya, your new parish to pastor.
I will never know the still face of a younger sister,
the vibration of a cello beneath my fingertips.
But I have a home out there
that keeps trying to find me,
who keeps extending her soft hand,
that faithfully remains,
so familiar, so patient,
so willing to wait for me.
