Homesickness

Airplanes

I see Airplanes
Every time
I look up
I look down
I look straightforward
I close my eyes

They follow me
Everywhere
Like ghosts
Haunting
Taunting
Mocking

Don’t know when
They got vicious
They used to be
My best friends
So hopeful I was
So feverish to see

They paint beautiful lines
All over the sky
Sometimes golden threads
Sometimes white like cotton
But always too far away

The third year now
They run away from me
I have missed
A million flights
Will one ever wait for me?
Like they used to do before?

Nothing more do I want
Than to soar through the skies
Cramped up in a tiny seat
The air is cold, the food bad
and the passengers annoying

I still miss flying
I miss what it bought me
I miss who it bought me

The Smell of Poverty

I love the smell of poverty
Cause it’s the smell of home
musty, dusty, crusty stairwells
Of food and grease and smoke

My grandpa in the kitchen
Summer heat blares everywhere
But nothing matters to a child
Whose bed is soft and tummy’s full

From higher up here it seems
cracks in the wall more visible
The water tastes slightly off
Not the sparkly kind I’m used to

And has grandpa always looked
So old, so fragile, so tired?
And have I always felt so
Disgusted and appalled?

I want to walk back, to what
They call “the good ol’ days”
When all I had was good
Cause I didn’t know better