Finding Home

Like a traveller,

my mind has wandered

the streets of different cities,

across different eras,

looking for home,

like an abandoned child

looking for her parents in the crowd.

My mind tries to find solace

in others,

meets with philosophers from all ages,

but soon realises that they too

are homeless.

So my mind builds its own home,

out of mortar, money and

all that it calls as ‘me’ and ‘mine’.

It puts in a bed,

a lock at the door and

a welcome mat at the front.

Yet my mind does not sleep at night

in that bed in that house with

the lock and welcome mat.

It lays awake thinking of how

to protect the home

that was supposed to protect me.

Anxious with fear,

she runs again through the dark and winding streets,

desperately crying out to all the faces she meets

to take her home.

Exhausted of the meaningless chase

for what could be

but is not,

my mind stops searching,

stops wanting,

and in that moment,

comes home.