I stumbled across this site some time ago: http://www.georgeellalyon.com/where.html.
It’s a poem where the writer explains where she’s from. Not by saying a name of a city or country, but rather by displaying images, smells, sounds.
Where I’m From
I am from clothespins,
from Clorox and carbon-tetrachloride.
I am from the dirt under the back porch.
(Black, glistening,
it tasted like beets.)
I am from the forsythia bush
the Dutch elm
whose long-gone limbs I remember
as if they were my own.
I’m from fudge and eyeglasses,
from Imogene and Alafair.
I’m from the know-it-alls
and the pass-it-ons,
from Perk up! and Pipe down!
I’m from He restoreth my soul
with a cottonball lamb
and ten verses I can say myself.
I’m from Artemus and Billie’s Branch,
fried corn and strong coffee.
From the finger my grandfather lost
to the auger,
the eye my father shut to keep his sight.
Under my bed was a dress box
spilling old pictures,
a sift of lost faces
to drift beneath my dreams.
I am from those moments–
snapped before I budded –
leaf-fall from the family tree.
I really like this “definition” of “where I’m from”, because it makes sense to us TCKs. We’re not tied to a certain country (like some people expect us to be), we define ourselves in a puzzle/rubick’s cube/tapestry kind of way. We are a collection of experiences, sights, sounds, smells, tastes, etc.
Then in the website she proposes people to write their own “where I’m from” poem. I think this can really help us, because we start to think and explore where we are really from.
I particularly like what she says at the end:
Remember, you are the expert on you. No one else sees the world as you do; no one else has your material to draw on. You don’t have to know where to begin. Just start. Let it flow. Trust the work to find its own form.
So I propose each person writes their own poem and posts it here!
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