The Way Home

Through the portion of clouds, sheer as poverty,
You can make out the silhouette of an open church -
With outstretched hope where strangers are closer than blood.

A place so low from the weight of its woe
Curbsides washed with commemorative tears, artists paints’ unused.

Could this be the way home?

Clenched heart and shaded eyes, eyes with no map
Footprints that hear pain so exquisite … the memory still burns.
And the wonder of measuring money to buy a ticket out.

Could this be the way home?

Where the Zumbro River serves up warm bread
As a respite from the ever-fluttering skyway.
Sheer as gauze worn from its wounds,
Lies the wooded hills where lost pride resides.
A place where vision is stripped by being so alone.

What manner of God could take me home …
Home seen through purple plains, tender flesh, with bits of freckled forest.
Warm in winter, there on the melting snow by the meadowlands.

Where Canadian geese gather, there where the portion of clouds
is sheer as poverty
Lies the way out, the way home.