Home

Sitting in this greasy,

all night, Michigan redneck, café,

sipping on dark stale coffee,

listening to the local philosophers

as they eat their breakfast,

on their way to dry-walling and other

assorted craft jobs,

indoors of course (getting to cold for outside work),

discussing the beating death

of a Wyoming fag (their word),

and how the poor ole boys who did it

will never get a fair trial,

what with all the negative publicity,

and what is this world coming too

when you can’t even bash a few fags around

and get away with it,

after all, they was just having a little fun,

they didn’t actually mean to

kill the little fucker (chuckles all around).

While listening the thought occurs,

that with just a different twist of fate,

I could be sitting at that table,

with all the other small town know-it-alls,

discussing world politics and Wyoming fags,

and it is only now that I realize

I don’t belong here anymore,

just as the swamplands and muskrats

of south jersey do not belong here,

this place I once called home

has become just another town

full of strangers and family

I no longer know,

nor care too;

this place leaves me feeling

so empty and impotent.

I think of my wife,

the woman who has been with me

for more years than I once lived in this place,

the woman whose touch still electrifies me,

the woman who has become my one constant,

my only reality,

the one thing I can depend on,

together we have built a new home,

free from family or friends interference,

she is where I belong;

she is my home.