There’s no place like it

they include me expansively in their gesture of home
and i crawl crumpled and squashed into their living

their satisfied smirks
that i have returned
– finally! –
make lie of the
truth
that i cannot both be here

and be me.

They rest in the confidence that
everything i remember is held in this place
and do not see that the shattered mirrors
of their cliche and nostalgia
distort them into a shape
i do not recognise.

There’s no place
that knows me like this one

but the me who is here
is not someone
i want to know.