What Was Poem by Lonnie Hicks

I can't go home;
even if I do
because that me going home
would be expected
to be
someone I haven't been in so very long.

How to be with family and friends
who constantly want to talk about
that young kid
who's long since moved on.

Out of klndness and memory
I play along
and let them
brag and fawn
over a person
long gone
into the forward years
while they look back
into what for you
is only the dimly remembered.

I told my mother to dismantle my room
dismantle the museum
keeping it that way, I said,
was inappropriate and too tempting
because I don't have the luxury
of looking back
while I am trying to move on.

So home is somewhat like an old love affair
nice while it lasted
but something which needs to be outgrown
as the truth is
one can never really
go back home
unchanged
from what was
then
the hurt in Mom's eyes
not withstanding.