The Panacea Is Home

• Elizabeth Baldwin, Grade 12, Merewether High School
• Poetry
• 2014

Finalist in the 'The Text Generation 2014' competition

When I sleep I am met with the scent of acacias blooming
And a thickness on my tongue that only comes from days so hot,
It seemed all the moisture had been swept up
And the world left bone dry.
The landscape had left its own mark on you,
Melichrous sap smeared like honey on your palms
And cuts trailing like a roadmap down your legs.
The sun had been an undulating haze straddling the horizon
Huddled melaleucas bathed in its warm glow.
As the night had encroached, the sky stained purple
My bare feet froze on hard packed, frozen earth.
A familiar ache blossomed in my chest as I thought of leaving
And I watched the sky, so different from the one I share now.
That sky had been made just for us,
And we would court the stars in the blue-black cold
The night’s pupils, learning of our fates