House and Home

For three years or so,
really in order to know,
in order to make order of a scattered life,
I have been making
shelters
shrines
structures in the shape of houses,
though I have found
no Simplicity pattern to follow
have found
no Good Housekeeping seal
to vindicate my plans
I simply find things lying around
–ordinary things–
stones from the trail
sticks and branches left bundled on the curb
brown paper bags and twine from the grocery
iris leaves
debris
bones, even.
I gather these things,
weave them,
tie them together,
join them into houses
I hope will make a home.
I am trying
at last, it seems,
to be a homemaker.