Red Ant & Oak (excerpt)

by Annabella Dlugi

Homing is an act of
Seeking comfort, in colors and
Cloth and food. Home is in the
Flowery quilt and the cookbooks piled up
And the smell of freshly dried laundry,
The way it steams the windows in winter.
Home is so common, and yet
When my grandparents sold their house and the woods
And moved in with us (their long term plan, they owned our house,
Bought it so I could go to school)
I didn’t realize how I’d lose it. Home,
The place I called and still call home is no longer
Of the quality I only know how to describe
As beautiful.

Annabella Dlugi is a recent graduate of Lawrence University where she studied English. She loves all things art, especially theatre and music, and is fueled by obscene amounts of coffee, friends, and water walks. Currently based in Brooklyn, she is missing the Midwestern fall colors and snow.