A Place called Home

Through desolate corridors of a run-down

building, her cries echoed as she hobbled
through dark passages; her head was a bundle
of fears, trapped in a cubbyhole she only
visioned in nightmares; her hands ran against
scraggy walls trying to figure a way out of it,
while faint voices in her head told her otherwise.

At a distance, a ray of light streamed in through
a tiny gap between boulders; the gap was a meager
size of a fist, enough for her to squeeze through
the tip of her fingers and then, for the first time
in three days, maybe more, she touched another
human being-a hand, coarse skin while a river
of tears rolled down her grime masked face.

As she stepped out, there stood a city in the gloom
of death, and just when the hollowness in her heart
was about to set in, she saw that familiar face
against the backdrop of the broken city.
running towards  him,  she flung her arms around
his shoulders, burying her face into the wonted
hollow of his chest, the faint scent of cedar lingering
in his shirt and she knew,

She was home. 

*First published in Songbook Circa, November 2011.