This Is What It Feels Like
a stranger in familiar land
my blood
too sings from the cracks
of cobbled streets
i can count paces
between the old and new
i felt it within delicate configurations :
carvings and photographs,
ceramic figurines dipped in resin
my Mama’d collected,
passing
down like water in a slow stream
tipped in gravity
like me
i heard a song and let it carry me
felt a pull outside the scenes
of my fatherland
a daughter meant to leave
said my impassive stars,
if actions were to mean anything
but what does meaning look like?
everything looks the same here
but older
i hang the washing, walk
to the shop for eggs and cheese
and when i go back
i fall right in-
to all the same places
(only I’m driving)
but ‘nothing’s too far away
these days’ i tell my sister
and my friends,
sipping
beer as good as Texas
on a Tuesday in the west end
dripping
with irony
and maybe even satisfaction
Copyright © Erin Beckett | Year Posted 2025
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