Home, they say, is many things:
Where your heart is,
Where you make it...
It is indeed many of these things;
A mismatched medley of keepsakes.
It is unmade and remade in those long years you have trotted farther and farther,
Among the love and laughter and togetherness.
Sometimes it is the long phone calls.
It lies within the shared memories.
Still, roots are stubborn old beings;
Harder to wrench free.
They keep bringing you back
To the old paths trodden,
To the scents of oil lamps and night jasmines,
To the mossy green of tree trunks,
And lush canopies and darting wings.
It is in the song of a magpie robin and shimmering yellow of the oriole.
Your heart flutters alike at the whiff of petrichor and the sizzling spices.
It dances to the various tunes of rain and shine;
To the dulcet of waves that chimes into night.
Alas, the place in your heart is like a feverish dream,
Slipping between your fingers.
The colours in the canvas have melded and evolved into something new.
Ever so slow at first,
But too fast to recognise as you realise.
Yet, the lingering remnants bind you tighter and tighter,
Crushing you in moments least expected.
You keep returning and try to take back home what you can;
Like a junkie in desperate need of a fix.