Homecoming

the rocket falling
all the years of stars collected in pearly pools
rush by as the white egret turns
to watch
in this melted dawn
our swift return to Earth

homecoming means
new hugs  new breath  new minutes
to lie down in
the grass of rivers and antiquity

I missed the wind the most
green lightning  fog  and
billion year old salt and sea
I breathe
I breathe the deep dust
the fresh and the dead  the moths  the beach
exhale hometown words: bougainvillea  San Diego  strawberry

sharing
French wine
the cologne of summer
the lacy languages of insects
in moonlit rooms
the blue emerging shadows
come
imbibing and elongating the hours
to an infinite moment
of awakening
beyond
that frozen journey
the evening served on tables of clouds
over
elegant draperies of rain









Wendy Rathbone has published over 500 poems in various anthologies and magazines, in addition to eight chapbooks. She won first place in the Anamnesis Press poetry chapbook contest with her book Scrying the River Styx. Her poems have been nominated for the Science Fiction Poetry Association's Rhysling award at least a dozen times. Unearthly, an omnibus collection of many of her published poems, is available on Kindle, as is her science-fiction novel Pale Zenith. She also writes and sells short fiction. She lives in Yucca Valley, CA with her partner of thirty-four years, Della Van Hise.