Where all things begin

Back home,
The roads turn into mud with the approach of the rains
And Ebok goes to work in the paddy fields
Once again she tells me the phuga wari
which frightened me as a child
Back home,
The air is cool, afternoons are drowsy,
The world gives way to the swaying bamboo trees
You could almost be the child who gave her heart
Much too recklessly.
Back home,
There is a sweetness and ache in all that I see
Because back home is a place I will never be
That place suspended in time has lapsed
So much has crossed over to the other side
You are transfixed by how little
your meagre life is of consequence
In the larger scheme of things.
But back home is where all things begin again.