The Home by Michael Brownstein

THE HOME

This is the sky that falls over us

the small injuries of daylight slip away,

our breath settling into karma and pause.

 

Inside the kitchen, the fresh smells of pandesal,

steaming black tea with a taste of cinnamon,

a platter of kamote, prawns, and sea cucumber.

 

Everywhere the shouts of hello, mabuting kaibigan,

mabuhay and soft gabi, magandang gabi,

soft night, good evening, welcome home.

 

In the morning the air almost turquoise,

cloud cover a myriad of streams entering a river,

sunlight in the distance, sunlight behind walls.

 

Day begins with irritations and inflections,

a quietude and a symphony of cymbals,

a cacophony of doors, voices, the clatter of plates.

 

Longganisa, milkfish belly, and hot tsokolate

thin enough to inhale, and then the sun yellows,

a car arrives, another day with people we never knew