Much as I might imagine

renovating a 1.5-bath church in Michigan,
sleeping beneath stained glass beams
until the pews can be reconstructed
into a proper bed
or claiming a tiny rock of an island
in Maine, complete with lighthouse 
and composting toilet,
it is truer to envision the home
my mother wants for me:
a little house on a quiet cul-de-sac
that backs up against a fire station 
and a park with two picnic tables
and a rickety slide.
This is the compromise dream, I think.
No more than two bedrooms,
certainly enough to live comfortably,
assuming it is alone;
blocks away from the secular job
I am apparently, in this draft of a life,
allowed to keep—
planted on the same hill she sledded 
down every winter of her childhood,
but allowed, at least,
on that white canvas
a little space of my own
to test my roots, to stretch my limbs,
to pollinate myself
and grow a crop of something new.