The Prodigal Son (a third edit)

The force that drew you home — each sunrise

you stood at a foreign window and watched

the returning sun, its rays hitting the sand,

as if the desert skin were a blind worm

wriggling its pink segments, slowly burrowing

into your heart and you emerge without expectation,

travel towards you father’s eager hand —was it stronger

than that which drove you to choose emigration?

And your brother, whose smile was lost

in the distant childhood that severed you both,

whose eyes stayed closed because he saw too clearly

your mother’s hand, how it lingered on your shoulder,

did he ever forgive you, who took for granted

all that he had not—forget your father’s words spoken

upon your return, what else could he utter to justify

his excitement as he spied you wandering up the road?

Did your mother’s eyes ever lose their sheen
of pain? Did cousins, once co-conspirators,
and family friends, always visiting, ever cease
that curious sideways glance in your direction?
And in the cloying heat of the many summer nights,
surrounded by familiar sounds, laying in your tossed bed,

as if a mariner trapped by contrary wind,

every time you exhale do you wish to again escape?