In all the time I’ve spent
everywhere but here,
I only ever wanted to be
anywhere but there.

Here is also there.
Here is more there
than I care to admit. How
to be present anywhere

is my Great Unknown.
On the shore I long for desert.
In the desert I thirst
for sea and shore.

In a monk’s cell I would dream
of dissolute throngs; in a mob
I would no doubt separate
and seek a nook in which to cower.

Family, did you ever imagine
I would ever settle well, nearby,
ready to drop in for a visit and stay a while?
Friend, beloved, did you ever fully believe

I was as much a nomad as you are?
Inside, the best face I can muster
is a sour one. All outside will see
sweetness, a lifelong facade.

I only know how to be absence
in your presence, and I am sorry,
but these times being what they are
it is a living of sorts. Onward.