Are You? Poem by Dorothea Tanning

If an expatriate is, as I believe, someone
who never forgets for an instant
being one,
then, no.

But, if knowing that you always
tote your country around
with you, your roots,
a lump

like a soul that will never leave you
stranded in alien subsets of
yourself, or your wild
entire;

that being elsewhere packs a vertigo,
a tightrope side you cannot
pass up, another way
to show

how not to break your pretty neck
falling on skylights:
reward-laden
mirages;

then, yes. All homes are home; mirages
everywhere. Aside from
gravity, there are no
limits,

never were, nor will there ever be,
no here and there to foil
your lotus-dreaming
legend.

Stay on the planet, if you can. It isn't
all that chilly and what's more,
grows warmer by the
minute.