Who will have me?

Country, land or city,
which will take me: mutt and motherless?
Who will have me, who would want a girl
who hasn't pedigree? Who will say
to me, "Sister, you are one of us"?

From stately town to forest vale, I wandered,
lonely, clouded heart and restless, journeys
only half-completed, always giving
up, half-hearted, only giving all
my heart to blankly staring boys who didn't

get it. Getting gone each time, afraid
to hear the rhyme, they'd say, "What do you mean?
What do you mean, you don't belong?" Of course,
to them it made no sense. For them a home
was made millennia ago, for them

a home is natural as the out and in,
as simple as their shouting sex. Belonging
isn't trying on, for them—it's shameless.
Why be afraid or shamed of one's own skin?
Who will have me? Not to take and fuck

and eat me—who will see me, want me near,
consider me as family? Who will say,
"Our love, so long we waited, never giving
up. We knew that you'd come back, we knew
you'd come to take your place among us, once

"whatever odyssey you'd sailed, whatever
wicked beast had jailed you, any trial
that delayed you, overcome. We knew
and here you are at last. Here you are.
Here you are at last. Here, at last."

for Vanessa

these fearsome marvels · Who will have me?