Where I'm From

I'm not from where the red fern grows.
I'm not from somewhere over the rainbow.
I'm not from where the wild things are.
I'm from an old flowering crabapple tree, whose branches were
my steed,
my broomstick,
my motorcycle,
my wings.

I'm from short lived snowball fights,

and drinking hot chocolate to warm up our noses and toes.

I'm from clover necklaces and matching springtime outfits,

and homemade chocolate chip cookies.

I'm from swimming with my cousins after tennis practice,

punctated with watermelon breaks.

I'm from leaf forts, my grandfathers's homemade spinach raviolis,

and wishing I could travel south with the birds and be gone with the wind.

I'm from the land the government gave my ancestors,
The land of the Red Man;
I'm from the path they took on their way here,
The Trail of Tears.
I'm from the dirt that matches that man.
I'm from the hereditary rosacea on my father's face, and his father's face.

I'm from the bookshelf in the basement.
Through its shelves I have traveled
to Hogwarts, to be sorted into Gryffindor,
to Wayside Elementary, to read a story backwards,
to Boston to catch an art thief,
to Greater Greensward, to kiss a frog prince,
to Whoville, to save a whole town by using my outdoor voice,
and to Narnia, to defeat a white queen.
I'm from a line of bookworms,
and someday, my name will be remembered,
and so will where I'm from



*Inspired by George Ella Lyon's Where I'm From