The Home of the 3rd Culture Kid: a poem in passing

Neither our parents nor our children's experience can explain

Language without borders galaxies with no name

We found comfort in being foreign to the family we had known

Familiar in distant lands of peoples unknown

To greet a stranger felt closer to home—fellow aliens bridge of cultures

a dialect not our own

Simple things hospited us most:

wild onions, backyard stolen swings, passports made of leaves—childhood dreams

Home is being counted as numerous as the stars—a place in time is all we need from Gilgamesh to Zanzibar

Stranded with longing

together with the Saints who walked alone

There are millions like us TCK’s

honored guests at your banquets

humble servants at your parades

We could be close as bark is to a tree, distant as a mountain peak to its ravine

Perpetual vagabonds in a land

not our own—troubadour smiles

Always longing for Home...