HOME SWEET HOME : A POEM

Oh sweet, sweet home,
Leaking roofs bleeding rain
On cold walls to rumpled concrete
Floored with the flood of a sky's tears.
Sweet sweet home;
Mother's recipe bubbling in the pot,
A scent to drown in the satiated belch
Of rotound stomachs letting out air.
Home, sweet, sweet home.

Little boys running naked
In the rain, holding hands
Like an offering to the sky,
Puddle splash on little girls' pinafores
And school bags filled with unripe fruits
Of labours unsanctified by fathers.
Home is sweet on the tongue
Of memory like stew on rice.
Home is sweetest within.

Sweet home, sweet, sweet home
Fleeing to the top of the tree
Lounging upside down, gossiping
Like bats roosting at dawn
And bangers blasting wings
At the square with little girls
Buying whistles, ribbons and sweets.
Home, Oh home, sweet home.

Tree climbers squashing red ants
In panicked flight from leaves
To soil, black hungry soil.
Dead men presiding over meals
In the absence of their bodies,
Listening to the lonely tears of widows
Drinking their grief with morning tea
And telling their sons that papa
Is in a better place.
Home is sweet.
Home is sweet.

Rice wrapped in leaves
And bean cake wrapped in leaves,
Cow skin thick with peppery sauce,
Goat skin soft with peppery sauce,
Beer, lots of beer,
Belching boys and laughing girls,
Sex, yes, lots of that
And death, the sacred stink of death.
Home is home and sweet indeed.

©warpedwhale, 2018.