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Mukul Dahal

Poet Mukul Dahal

Back home,

home begins with its physical shape

you dream about. You have an appointment

with a piece of land, you look at it, try it on,

as if it were a wedding suit.

Back home,

to have a home means to own a house,

a building you build on your own.

Mother says, everyone has one;

Are you going to leave your kids a wind?

Back home,

you work to earn money, a school teacher,

a civil servant, if you have no qualification,

run a tea stall, or work on the farm, for years

Or get visa to go abroad and work like a mule.

Even if the blood in your veins has dried,

you need to have home of your own.

After you own a strip of land,

Your budget needs scaffolding.

Your dream haunted by sand,

bags of cement, electric wires, pipes and pebble.

You keep moaning against the builders who do not show up

in time, or do not show up at all, and the delay bites you.

You wonder when you will have

a house with open yard and a window

from which you see a full moon.