Missing the ones back home

"Absence is to love what wind is to fire; it extinguishes the small,
it enkindles the great." - Roger de Rabutin

 

Click on the audio bar below to hear the "Homesickness" episode of Ellen Kusher's
Sound & Spirit radio progam (WGBH/Public Radio International).

 

And to end with today, a poem from Jane Yolen (shared with her permission), inspired by the photograph at the top of this post...although it is, she says, as much about her husband David (who died six years ago) as it is about my photo of Howard and Tilly. Art is like that.

 

Longing for Home

I see you from behind,
walking the familiar path,
the twisting, winding road
that goes through the hills,
and long to be going home
to twine you in my arms,
to make a nest in our bed,
to call in the dog from the hearth,
and be there in our home.
The wind is at my back
when I want it in my face.
If I call, will you answer
or just keep walking on?

- Jane Yolen

 

"Longing for Home" copyright 2012 by Jane Yolen. The poem may not be reproduced in any form without the author's permission.