“I love my home. It is a poem.”

List significant addresses of your life. Circle one. Imagine this house, apartment, room, condo has an inner life, a soul, a voice. This dwelling tells the story of you and/or your family.

She accepted me right away.

She was different than the others, didn’t want to tear me down.

Accepted my smallness, saw beyond the dusty rose walls and carpets, the smell of oldness, the yellow kitchen that didn’t work.

She found peace in me, and I, for the first time since I was built 81 years ago, knew peace, too.

She wasn’t going to change me quickly, and if she did, she knew my essence as she was about to discover hers.

Fleeing as she was from trying so hard to make something work that didn’t—here she could live alone, with her new dog, with her dreams, and maybe that baby she longed for.

someday.

she used the word sanctuary. I liked that

So when it began to rain embers, I held on with the arches she loved—we fought against them, I felt her telling me she was not leaving me or the memories of what we shared ever and to fight—she was a fighter—and I yelled out from the flames you will survive this and I will still be there with you

because together we shared our foundation.

it was sturdy.

it came from respect.

I am still there, my essence, and yours, mingled, while others said “when will you remodel, when will you sell?” year after year you said, “I love my home. It is a poem. Fuck off.”

And now, when you come to visit, the ghost of me won’t haunt you, but protect you and your baby girl and that dog

this ghost of a home sends you all the love you gave it

and there’s some stuff buried in the right front of the yard you’re gonna find sometime.

a little surprise I saved for you.

And thanks for coming every week to see me, I appreciate it.

I’ll see you soon again.

Next time bring some water for that hydrangea—it’s about to bloom.

— Karen Leigh Hopkins