The Homecoming

The Teachers Speak. . . .there are many ways to explain the life most lead on the Earth planet with even a normal set of senses.  Yet there are so many different ways outside the senses and if one tried to understand fully the picture,  one would become immobile.   There are that many.   One of the easiest premises to help explain this life is to realize that all time is simultaneous.   That there are people who have lived with this premise and had productive lives astounds even those of us outside the Earth’s boundaries.  What we have are people who without science giving it the name of quantum physics have learned to live with time’s phases changing as they have walked in the streets.  That they have learned to accept these phases in their perspective leads us to honor them in what ways we can.  Those with challenging chronic conditions often also hold  different perspectives that help them in many ways and also hinder them when trying to lead lives as normal as possible.   When these people come to our attention,  and they do because of soul stuffs shining their wattage,  we try ourselves to remember what conditions were like and we give as much help as possible.   

(I was walking home from work one evening and the sidewalk changed  beneath my feet to become a walk of cobblestone.   My  pant suit changed to a skirt as it  swirled about my ankles and I had on a pair of shiny boots.   It was twilight and the street became another but familiar and the streetlights became lantern lights.   It lasted for almost a block and then I was on my familiar corner, ready to turn down my street.   This was one of the most vivid  bleed through events I had  had to that time.  Still happening?  The 17th or 18th centuries?  But there were others and as many of them as I have poems in my files.  The following poem will have new meaning to those who have been following my blog.)

The Homecoming

My warm breath makes a circle
of clear space on the frosted pane.
I gaze at empty horizons,
willing your outline to appear
to give this day extra measure.

You move with water pails swinging
from shoulders whose strength
I know by heart,
with strides cleanly cutting
the knee high snow, effortlessly.

I move within the circle and my warm world,
eagerly awaiting your shout
and stamp of feet on the threshold,
feeling already your cold face
along the line of my throat.
The woolen nap of your winter shirt
is rougher even than my hands.

It’s been too long you say since you left.
And I laugh.  Hardly time enough
to clean the barn for barely
were you gone an hour.
And here already.
My day has taken shape.
******
The stamp of feet, the key turns
and the door clicks open.
My hands press the smooth fabric
of your well tailored coat
and do not catch.
I take the leather briefcase from your  hands
and lift my head for the homecoming.
It’s been so long that you are gone, I say,
and you laugh.
I’ve only been gone a week this time,
you say.

I turn again to the window
and find it frosted over.
And know that worlds have died
and been reborn in less time.

And today, another one.

Art by Claudia Hallissey