Homesickness as Particle Theory
An atom cannot exist
if the center does not hold.
Matter cannot hold
if the atoms swing apart
too far—
that summer night:
I could feel the pieces of my life
circling away from me in distances so vast
the volume of separation
seemed infinite.
I caught
the wisp of my grandfather’s
pipe smoke,
the saturated indigo
of a green downstate summer evening,
every window open
to the chance of sleep
in deep humidity,
washed in waves of cricket song
and the far pungent howl of a coyote
edging the cornfields.
All in seconds
lifted away.
I felt
the earth turn, the arm
of a galaxy tremor.
Can my atoms know
enough by their contact—
memory,
is it a vibration?
Must I touch my life
to still know it?
Though I lay still
I could feel myself grasping
for the scent of thunderstorm,
the taste of lightning,
a nine-volt.
My body was smaller,
my hair lighter blonde,
my bones full of hope.
As the dusk drained out
its purples and fell to blue,
I was in two places at once.
That night
my hair had the slight iron smell
of well water
or the river.
by Miranda Barnes
from Eccotheo Review