Ezra D. H. Simmons

Notes from the Composer:
 

Home.
 

Home is warm.  

Home is breathing.  

Home is sacred.  

 

Home is where I took up space, 

Where I let my thoughts flow, 

Where I rest.

 

Home is alive.

Home is centering.

Home is illuminating.

 

Home is calm with spontaneity,

Endless encouragement,

Unbridled love.

 

Home was pretending to be Indiana Jones, 

Getting spider bites after jumping in leaf piles,

And heated arguments with my sibling.

 

Home was trying to solve my algebra homework with fits,

Board games in the evenings,

One chapter aloud every night, no more.

 

Home was looking at the ground 

To avoid the ants when I walk,

To ‘stand up straighter,’

To make myself just like it.

And home was a very strict teacher.

 

Home made me critical of myself.

Home made me a perfectionist to a fault.

Home made me think I could be someone.

 

Home made me feel different 

Than those around me.

Home isolated me not through walls

But through how I think and act.

 

Home seemed different.

Not just from itself, but from others’ too.

And then it was gone.

 

Because it went, 

I can only remember.

It’s what I have left.
 

It is my burden.

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It is me.

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