Homesick

Three thousand miles, a river, and a mountain range separate me from my home

All I am and all I love are left on common ground

As I walk among strangers here beside a harbor

Watching this western water

Where boats for tourists are docked and waiting

For the right price to come along

Older couples, retired I’m sure

Walk hand in hand and smile as I pass

I see the urban youth in struggle

To impress with fashion or deed

And mourn their lack of knowing

The blessedness of open country

Of the smell of freshly turned fields,

Of a turkey’s thunder and a small farm pond,

Of the trees that sing with bird song

Cities, they hold no call for me

For concrete has no voice as locusts in the summer night

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