This Flat, A Home

this flat, a home

for six years

four bedrooms filled

with us five, and

countless guests, pilgrims

gratefully received

we recall the painful

waiting, it came slowly

to us from generous hands

then faith found us dancing

wildly in our safe haven

in a crazy city, strange

to us, a cathedral for

our hopes and prayers

with almost an acre of

polished marble for

sophia’s first steps, and

splitting her tender chin

for dania’s dance and her

dramatics, and for skateboards

and balls under alexis’ feet, better

acoustics for her silly songs of

worship and ours, blessed snacks

we called meals, rooms so sparse

soon filled up with finds from

markets, flowers planted, trees

we made it our own, parties and

petitions spilling onto the street

abundant smiles, crowds of kids

coming, going, the guard outside

won us over, the tears of a maid

who knocked first, we believed

we were called, and this flat

a gift, some friends will endure

the breach, so much will

end, leaving our hearts

heavy on the day we

pull the door closed

for the last time

**Dedicated to A-113 Ground Floor, New Friends Colony, New Delhi, 110 025, INDIA,

our home address from October 2005 to July 2011.