"no room in the inn"

home

never felt so much like

home,

unless i was

home alone in my room, or

climbing a tree, or

swinging freely to my music in the backyard.

home

was never

home,

simply due to the presence of family.

home felt

as i felt:

uncertain/

unsafe/

insecure./

"no room."

home came consistently much later in life.

no matter how badly i wanted it in my youth,

home would wait for me to be ready.

in the hushed corners of my self-esteem,

bristling with goodness and assuredness,

home preened.

i prowled trails in my psyche that led to thoughts and patterns i had never recognized before.

when i entered the working world, at the lucky age of thirteen,

it became clear that much of that world was not made for tender me.

i buried myself deep inside a hardened exterior,

compulsively performing what i was told my home should be.

by the time i reached fifteen, i knew the person beholden to such forms wasn't real,

but ventriloquism kept a desperate hold on my lips/

my words/

my body./

i moved, dressed, spoke, and thought as heteronormatively as possible,

denying my home more than thrice.

by twenty, my performance was ending, but home was still somewhat distant from my mind.

a chemically induced self-awareness guided my efforts at first, but

in time,

the work came more naturally, and

home followed those vital passions.

social education taught conformity, but

heart taught love, and through that lesson a

home/

self/

purpose/

was found.

i'm thirty-five now,

freshly minted,

and more full of home than ever before.

i made my room and

it soothes me wherever i am/

informs my decisions/

offers reprieve from relentless drudgery./

i searched for years,

poured my soul into what i thought i needed:

romance/

sex/

career/

you name it.

ultimately,

home found me, but only

when i was ready to receive.