Hallucinated Reality 5 Home at Last - Andrew Barham

Finally …

I feel
At home
At last …

My little space
In my little place

Kitimat
My flat
Ain't no
Mon Desir!

It's a 2-bed
One-floor walk-up
In an apartment building
60's built and boxy
Set between
Two other buildings
Just like it
Surrounded
By large carparks
And a bit rundown
(There's a big hole in the carpet,
For example.)
But
In behind the carpark

The Wilderness
Beginning
The Great Bear Rainforest
To the West
Home of Kermode
Sacred
Spirit
Bear
(Though not found round here!
But occasionally seen
60 km North of here …)
A
White
Black
Bear …

A home is where you find it
And what you make
Of your own
Hallucinated Reality there:

The furniture from Guernsey
And elsewhere
Collected along the way,
Candlesticks and candelabra
I bought from Peter
Lord Saumerez
The antique
Coloured brandy and sherry glasses
Bought
From the Red Cross Charity Shop
Or
The Antique Fair
At the St Peter Park Hotel
Labelled beer glasses
From pubs
In London
Cornwall
Manchester
Guernsey
Whisky and Brandy glasses
From the Houmet Taverne
The Oak table
Chucked by the dumpster
At my Mum's Co-op
The bookshelves
Pulled form the decaying garage
On 12th Avenue
Point Grey
The canoe paddle
My brother gave me
On my birthday
So long ago
The tapestries and carpets
I acquired
In Strathcona –
Like the winerack –
Cast off and forgotten;
Even a handful
Of my books …

I feel
So
Comfortable
Home, At Last:

No one
Can touch me here
For I have found
Sanctuary …

Andrew Barham

This is part of a series of "Hallucinated Reality" poems in which the title is actually imbedded within the poem. Thus, these poems are titled, but the title does not appear at the top, but somewhere within the poem.