Homesick

I am not ET. I try so hard to fit in, to settle. But somehow, I never do.

I sit on the outside, looking in.

I understand the language, eat some of the food with gusto, relish some of the literature.

Sitting outside, on the beach or under a tree.

I reflect and collect myself for the next day of conforming.

A bit like pretend play, which I didn’t like as a child

But here it is a grown up playing pretend dressing up,

Always query wherever I go, What is the dress code? but I mostly get it wrong, anyway.

I am homesick not to go back somewhere I left a long time ago.

The memories are hazy.

The children I grew up with decades ago, have evolved into middle aged adults.

Speaking a language, I do not understand and living lives I have no share in.

Looking in from the outside, even the lay of the land is changed beyond recognition.

I am homesick of a place I am not told on a daily basis, that I am not from here, I don’t belong,

Like your accent, great dress sense, so garish, said in voices, that have me throw up my breakfast.

But I have tried years ago to adapt, to local ways nobody seems to follow.

I am homesick, of a town, village, country.

Where it doesn’t matter, where you are from and if your grand-parents haven’t been born here.

Where people don’t call your favourite food exotic.

Where children can play their games without constantly being reminded that,

They are not welcome as friends.

I am homesick for a slice paradise lost and forgotten.