Cutting cords

The first cord that was cut

Was from my stomach to my mum

They did it haphazardly

Now my belly button sits

Somewhere between

Out and In

When a finger brushes past the wrong place

I almost vomit and scream

Like my body remembers

This first day

Leaving it’s first home - and arriving in this new place

-

   

Everything that is born

must learn to endure

all of life’s cut cords

-

I moved countries at 8

Left a home I could no longer stand to live in

Needed to run from a village

And all that had been done to me

But my feet stepped on scorched earth

My feet bare on sand - quickly burnt

My tongue didn’t yet - know how to curl my words

My body disassociated

Where I was running from

And now where I was

Home was not a place - I learnt

-

Everything that is born

must learn to endure

all of life’s cut cords

-

First loves

Fleeting

Bleeding

Hoping

Dreaming

Failing

Grieving

At 13

All of it to a soundtrack of Bon Iver Skinny love

Thought I could control it with under-eating

-

Everything that is born

must learn to endure

all of life’s cut cords

-

Parents together

Home fractured

Parents apart

Two beds

Nowhere felt like home

I carried a backpack with me everywhere

Home  - was on my shoulders

-

Everything that is born

must learn to endure

all of life’s cut cords

-

Fell in love for real

To a boy

Who made home something I could feel

Home  - became him

Until eventually my heart made the whole world dive into a tailspin

My soul needed more than his four walls

But home - was my head on his chest

-

Everything that is born

must learn to endure

all of life’s cut cords

-

Home - not yet myself

I searched for home - in the arms of strangers

Not my share house or the dormitory beds

No bed or boy felt like mine

Everything was transitory

Until a boy took away my choice

The hands of a boy

Began to feel like a threat

-

Everything that is born

must learn to endure

all of life’s cut cords

-

Moved cities

And countries

Birthed new identities

Home - never found in a man again

Yet for a long time

Their presence

Sat on my body like an echo

-

Everything that is born

must learn to endure

all of life’s cut cords

-

Saved for a house

Dreaming of a home

Learning how expensive it is

To own bricks of your own

Each one I try to make mine

I soon find out

Is crumbling

-

Everything that is born

must learn to endure

all of life’s cut cords

-

Now-  I’m home

In my heart

In my body

With my soul

Each time something ends

I trust the process

My body each month will shed

And I will change my sheets

I sit with myself

Again finding home - in me

-

Everything that is born

must learn to endure

all of life’s cut cords

-

But occasionally

One of my fingertips

Catches on something

And I brush past it all

I try not to vomit

And I try not to scream

-

Everything that is born

must learn to endure

all of life’s cut cords

-

Home is not in the bricks

Home is not in the mortar

Home is not in the arms of a man

Home is a heart state

And its in your trust

And willingness to wake up

And begin again

-

Everything that is born

must learn to endure

all of life’s cut cords