The Home That Wasn’t

I never lived on Cape Breton—

just came when I could,

chasing the quiet

like a man chasing warmth

in the smoke of another’s fire.

Still, the land spoke.

Not in words,

but in wind through tamarack

and loon-call twilight

over Bras d’Or’s patient blue.

A scenic coastal view showing a large body of blue water stretching to the horizon, with a curved sandy beach and low hills or mountains visible in the distance. The foreground features lush green vegetation and shrubs, while the sky appears clear with a soft blue-gray color. The landscape suggests a peaceful, natural coastal setting with rolling terrain extending along the shoreline.

Derek Hatfield, CC BY 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

I’ve seen it in all her moods—

spring rising shy and soft,

fog lifting like a veil from the hills.

Summer thick with salt and sunburn,

kids leaping from docks,

the echo of laughter carrying

farther than it should.

But it was autumn that claimed me.

A blaze of fire in the trees,

like the whole island had set itself alight

just to say: look what you could belong to—

if only you’d stay.

Even winter felt less cruel there.

Snow drifted slow as thought,

and the cold didn’t bite

so much as invite

you inward—

to stew pots, old tunes,

the hush of a world

that doesn’t beg to be conquered.

Every visit, I thought—

maybe next time,

maybe I’ll plant something here

besides footsteps.

Maybe I’ll let these shores

claim me proper.

But the years came fast,

and the rest of my life

stayed tethered elsewhere—

to jobs,

to promises,

to people who never heard

the lilt in the wind

that I did.

Now, I know—

I’ll never live there.

Never see the leaves turn

from the same porch

year after year.

Never watch the ice creep in

and think, this is mine to wait out.

Still, when I dream,

it’s of spruce shadows,

and gulls wheeling above

a quiet that forgives me

for never belonging.

Maybe
that’s what made it home

all along—

not the claim I made on it,

but how gently

it never asked.

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