Home is wherever I'm with you.

This is something which I wrote when asked to write about 'home'. Surprisingly, it wasn't a place that I thought of, but rather a person - my mum. Although perhaps not so surprisingly considering I'm pretty sure I was still tipsy from the night before.

It was inspired by this song:

So anyway, I did a bit of editing and re-jigging and here we are (I have re-written it as a poem too, but I'm saving that to try and enter somewhere!). I printed this off for my mum for a Christmas, present I hope you like it.

Home

You’d wrap me up in your fair-trade skirts that hung with beads. In there I felt invincible, sat in my castle of cotton. You’d pull your perfume around me, so familiar that if I caught it on the street in a country far away, I looked for you in the crowd.

The chime of your silver bracelets would let me know you were around, perhaps doing the washing up or hanging out the laundry. On holiday, you’d drop them to the bottom of the pool for me to dive down and bring up. I’d keep my eyes open to see your face through the water as I rose triumphantly to the surface, over and over again.

I’d brush my hand through your earring stand, listen to the wooden toucans and silver drops knock together as a musical instrument of you. A gemstone percussion of amethyst, rose-quartz and jade.

I’d run my fingers over your arms and count your many freckles, remnants of your childhood in Aden. Days spent sunbathing, lathered in oil, before you knew it was bad for you. You didn’t like them but I was jealous – I wanted to map out a life in pigment as you had, collect my travels on my skin.

I see traces of your pigment everywhere; your glow is on my own skin and your tones are in my voice. You hold so many colours and I’m proud to paint from your palette.