Home is the excited thudding of a tail against the wall before you open the front door
Home is a wet nose pushed hopefully against your knee as you prepare dinner
Home is the pitter-patter of paws meandering down the hallway
Home is the contented, full-body sighs stretched out on the rug in front of the fire
Home is always, unashamedly, pleased to see you
And we love to be home.
By Lucie Garland
First, were only Chaos, Eros and Gaia. Those were native forms. Gaia, without any sexual contact, gives birth to Uranus, who had as extent as she and also gives birth to Ocean who during his birth overflew every valley of his mother. She shared her power with Uranus and create universe by giving birth to their ingredients. She, our first mother, made for us a home.
Chara Georgaki
When I walk through the door ,
after a holiday,
put the kettle on,
and put my feet up ,
on the settee.
When I go to Mum’s
after a long train journey,
and have a cup of tea,
on her settee.
When my girls come to ours
and we snuggle ,
watching tv , on our settee.
When I find a great story,
and read it for hours,
on our settee.
When someone is out and
we eat our tea,
on our settee.
And when I go to my special beach.
Maria Butler
Home is… family. Warm hugs that last a lifetime. Sunshine and dog walks. Long nights on the sofa watching antiques road show with tea. Laughter. So much laughter. Board games. Arguments. Silly voices. Terrible jokes. The smell of dinner. Tea and cake at 5. Baths with overflowing bubbles. Piles of books. Stacks of old photographs. Hours spent picking what to watch on Netflix. Mum bringing you tea in the morning. Dad sneaking you in when your drunk. Home is my family, and my family are my home.
Asha Booth
What the hell is home to me I can't be free From what this house confines to be Expressively I'm stuck between Leaving town and planting trees The roots I freeze aren't there to please A ground of immaturities I welcome change from something please A lack of answer was a breeze To keep a pretence stuck on lease To jump from rat to rat like fleas No grounded sight to keep a tease Home is not under the seas But a shackle where I lay my head A home is where I go to bed.
Anonymous. UWE Student
“Home is when snow and wind burn your face, but you are too happy to care, because it brings back childhood memories of skiing on ice sheets while wearing jeans in western Massachusetts.
Instagram: @sparouge
Chacun a ses madeleines.”
“Zuhause ist… wo man sich an mich erinnert”
“Home is… where I am remembered.”
Bianca Saad
Home to me.. it’s not so much this place that I live, it’s a feeling, a feeling of safety. The safety of knowing when you get home drunk, your phone will be put on charge for you. Knowing that when you’re hungry and have a headache, you will be given a bacon sandwich and a cup of tea (even though you’ve never liked tea, but will drink it if you have a headache).
Home is the smell of my dogs fur and the sound of her snoring. The sound of my mother moving things into a safe place I.e – oblivion. And home is no longer family alone, it’s this person that I am creating a future with, the person who makes me feel safe and the person I feel at home with.
What I’m trying to say is.. home, to me, is not just a building that holds photos and childhood toys. Home is everything and everywhere, as long as the people and pets are with you, you will always be at home.
Lucy Hesford
I was there when you arrived. Young babe in swaddling close to mother’s breast. Yet I remember before that. The rush to paint the walls. The rush to build the furniture in a recent vacant space, expectant of your arrival. You nearly never came home. Your mother, too.
But you both did; it was tumultuous and I saw it all. The first time you cried, your stumbling, your tumbling, and your failed attempts to walk. I heard your first sounds. Echoing sounds, decibels of noise in my silent, empty space. I answered back: silence.
“Milk”, you cried, yet you didn’t know the sound for that yet.
It was in the smell of fresh paint and freshly made formula, where you lay. I saw you. A crib, a fortress, of which you tried to escape. I watched. I didn’t understand why.
Time passes.
I saw you. Cotton-polyester jumper too big but enough to grow into. Trousers taut at the hems that were lovingly stitched. Awkward clothes made to last. I saw you come home with tattered, broken shoes, despite the half-broken pleas of: “but Mum, I was playing football!” which fell upon silent ears. The crib was gone a while ago. A bed. You would pass in and out of view as you exited and returned; chasing dreams, ideas, thoughts that were way too large for your head. “School”, they called it, but it left you confused, silent, drowned, yet you still managed to swim.
Time passes.
I remember you coming home. Head heavy, full of anaesthetic. Your head slumps down on the settee, cushion and blanket underneath your head. “It’ll get better soon,” they said. They said the operation was a success. You smelt of ammonia, operations, and hospital. I saw the blanket get thrown away.
Time passes.
I’ve been there watching. Waiting. My colours change, and the contents change. New furniture, curtains. New objects, items, trinkets. But still, I see you, and I watch you.
Time passes.
A year. Anesthetised, heavy, body burdened by a weight far too heavy to carry. “It’s fixed”, they say. He’ll be able to hear”. But I see you grow. Develop. Change. But you can’t hear. Until you come home, device as part of you. Mechanical crutch. “Hearing aid”, they call it. “Home will be the best remedy!”.
It shocked you. You can suddenly hear the echoes against the walls and the water running and the lazy cat that never moved – you look at her. You hear her, purring. Softly, gently. This scares you.
Noise is scary. It is too loud. Too fast. Too constant. I see that you turned to books. To words. To escape the burden of a heavy-laden tongue and ears that can’t quite hear. The written word never tries to escape the tongue.
Time passes.
New clothes, same ordeal.
I watch you out of my beady little eyes, just out of focus but never out of view. You’re older now. And so am I. My eyes are wizened and blurred with age, and smudged by many coats of paint. Your body has changed. Alarm clocks just don’t seem to work for you. I see you struggle, yet I can’t help. My arms are tied behind plasterboard and paint. I was there, I saw you, when you came to terms with being deaf.
Your hearing is now clogged by a misty hearing aid tube screaming profanities to the Goddess of Noise. You profane to her, and curse it all. You go to leave.
It’s her shit to deal with now, not mine.
I’ve not seen you for a while.
Anonymous English Literature PhD Student.
whatishometoyou.home.blog 