Notes About The Poem
This poem recalls a time when Ruth and I, and our two sons , one who was 1 1/2 years old, the other 1 month old were homeless. My position as a music educator had been cut, Ruth had let her nurses license lapse. Without a home and without money, our little family lived with my folks and Ruth's folks for about 6 months as I was looking for another job. Everything we owned was stored in a semi-trailer parked on the farm of Ruth's parents. I have been blessed to be married to a most remarkable woman. I have always considered myself a student sitting at her feet and learning how to love. The picture, below, is of Ruthie during this homeless time in our life together.
At Home Without a Home
The semi-trailer sits at the farm,
a gift from your dad,
holding everything we own,
except some of our clothes,
and that of our sons,
and Pampers.
Homeless, my pride beaten down,
humility or is it humiliation, it’s master.
Your pride is not a self-consuming
passion, the first of an
ever-growing realization
that I’m not the educator of our family
but a merely a student
learning at your feet.
Your pride is measured
in our sons, in our marriage,
our homelessness not a
defeat, but a mere fact.
Your own family’s past,
family falling upon family
during times of difficulty and duress,
defines what is important.
Shuffling between families’ homes
an inconvenience of love,
not acts of desperation.
As long as we and our sons are together
no longer is home narrowly defined
to structures above or below ground,
but only defined by relationship.
You are at home in our homelessness.
(c) 2012, Robert Charles Wagner. All rights reserved.
Copyright © Robert Wagner | Year Posted 2020
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