Established 2005 Registered Charity No. 1110656

Scottish Charity Register No. SC043760

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October – November 2024 : Change READ ONLINE

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Home is where the hope is

June 01 2024

Three poems taking on the themes of home, loneliness and hope. Words by Marsha Glenn, Mohammed Musa and Janet Wilkes

No. 64 Park Road
by Marsha Glenn


I had four walls.
I had a door,
I could lock it:
                                        Serenity.
There were floating clouds in the window frame,
darkness,                         ceramic owls
of different shapes and colours.
House plants that kept dying.
In my twisted thoughts
            I still had hope.
 
I had tried and tried
to make my home:
in three different countries,
    in 10 different houses
        in 24 different rooms.

I felt I belonged there
even when I was too tired of selling burgers            
even when I was too hurt from the man
                I wanted to be loved by.
And I could let myself go there,
I’d surrendered to my darkest thoughts,
hoping by next morning I would feel better.
I learnt to give up on
blaming others for my miseries.

I have learned
to never stop
        rebuilding
        my dream of  
home.


People need homes
by Janet Wilkes

Only single buds will burst their
Skins and green the tree where the fields
Once were, with deep rooted thistles,
Buttercups and clover. Only
The scarecrow, that vagrant man with
A glint in his eye (that’s neither
Friendly nor harsh), will loiter by
Flats being built in the fields where
He stood all day long keeping watch.
People forget the scent of late
Summer as it ends in the fields
And shades of green in the hedgerows.
But the single buds that burst their
Skins, that green the tree will catch the
Eye of the vagrant man who will
Look up and say, “People need homes
And I’m going there – I’m homeless
Now and I’ve done my time on the land.”


Not alone
by Mohammed Musa

Once about a time there were friends travelling around the world. One friend said “bro, let's chill on the seaside, on top of the bridge.” The sea was blue and its waves went up and down.

The city were beautiful, not many friends had been here before but one day there were a shadow of a ghost behind a broken mirror in my house. It was white and had scars and screeched. No one was in the house but I've felt I was not alone.

When I opened the door to my room, I felt there were somebody near me, I heard the sound of the footsteps. I knew there was somebody there with me, that I was not alone

The mirror made sounds, screams again, the man in the mirror was not me

My door was green, the window broken. The door was locked from the inside. Sounds coming from outside.

There were no sound. There were no hope in my broken cells but there were someone I could trust and again I was not alone.

< Learning from Narcissus Doing time, part I >
October – November 2024 : Change

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