Construed as turf, home just seems a provisional claim, a designation you make upon a place, not one it makes read more

Construed as turf, home just seems a provisional claim, a designation you make upon a place, not one it makes on you. A certain set of buildings, a glimpsed, smudged window-view across a schoolyard, a musty aroma sniffed behind a garage when you were a child, all of which come crowding in upon your latter-day senses -- those are pungent things and vivid, even consoling. But to me they are also inert and nostalgic and unlikely to connect you to the real, to that essence art can sometimes achieve, which is permanence.

The whitewash'd wall, the nicely sanded floor,
The varnish'd clock that click'd behind the door;
The chest read more

The whitewash'd wall, the nicely sanded floor,
The varnish'd clock that click'd behind the door;
The chest contriv'd a double debt to pay,
A bed by night, a chest of drawers by day.

When the hornet hangs in the holly hock,
And the brown bee drones i' the rose,
And read more

When the hornet hangs in the holly hock,
And the brown bee drones i' the rose,
And the west is a red-streaked four-o'clock,
And summer is near its close--
It's--Oh, for the gate, and the locust lane;
And dusk, and dew, and home again!

For the whole world, without a native home,
Is nothing but a prison of larger room.

For the whole world, without a native home,
Is nothing but a prison of larger room.

Home is a name, a word, it is a strong one; stronger than magician ever spoke, or spirit ever answered read more

Home is a name, a word, it is a strong one; stronger than magician ever spoke, or spirit ever answered to, in the strongest conjuration.

And the daughter of Zion is left as a cottage in a vineyard, as a
lodge in a garden read more

And the daughter of Zion is left as a cottage in a vineyard, as a
lodge in a garden of cucumbers, as a besieged city.

A man builds a fine house; and now he has a master, and a task for life: he is to read more

A man builds a fine house; and now he has a master, and a task for life: he is to furnish, watch, show it, and keep it in repair, the rest of his days.

At length his lonely cot appears in view,
Beneath the shelter of an aged tree;
Th' expectant read more

At length his lonely cot appears in view,
Beneath the shelter of an aged tree;
Th' expectant wee-things, toddling, stacher thro'
To meet their Dad, wi' flichterin noise an' glee.

The ache for home lives in all of us, the safe place where we can go as we are and read more

The ache for home lives in all of us, the safe place where we can go as we are and not be questioned.