Home (poem)

By Luke Labern

I have come home.
I found it much the same:
The windows were open;
The walls still bear my name.

No clearer than it's ever been
Because it always was.
Better, though, than any one,
Any place, or any thing—because

I am who I say I am
And you are nothing more
Than material for the writer
Behind the lion's door.

Opiates as alive
And as essential as ever;
Philosophy as vital as
Infinity to forever.

Never. Never forget
The sacrifices you have made
To get you where you are—
The sharp side of the blade.

Time passed; things past:
The Remembrance of such things
Is the art of memory
And the nostalgia it brings.

Do this with case,
But listen, son of Proust:
Too little future plus too much past
Is nothing but a noose.

Look on, and on,
Even when you die:
If life is cyclical, at least
We might have another try.

But nothing can be gained
From worship of what's done:
Life subsists not in zero,
But dividing by one.

Return home if that place
Is on the move—
At least there you know
You've nothing to prove.

Close the curtains
And fall into bed:
"Sink into white
And shiver," he said.

What you left need not stay there
If you know it is right:
Better to aim at Greatness
Than regret all that might—