Mother tongue . . .
Last night, I remembered Mom.
Not the first time. Oh no!
She lives in me, you see.
She has never left.
Nor has my Dad, my father-like older uncle,
My younger uncle,
Or my sister-like cousin,
All hearts of gold,
Unchipped, raw.
Last night welcomed me
In my mother tongue
To a setting that felt like home . . .
Again.
It had been too long of a while
When I last visited her . . .
A surprise guest made her entrance.
Homesickness, she said, is my name.
I knew her too well from decades ago.
She and I hit it off right from the first go.
Again.
We reminisced. She too had missed me.
Where was I all these years, she wanted to know.
Life, I replied, holding back my bittersweet tears.
What brought you to me today, she asked.
Mother tongue . . .
(c) hülya n. yılmaz, 3.2.2019
hülyaswritings 
Your enchanting poem tugs at the heartstrings of they whose mother tongue, cultureally speaking, embraces more than one communicator, as in the languages of more than one culture’s tongue, as well as all aspects of their held influences.
Your touching poem gives substantial food for thought, and taste for we who have lived and appreciated the richness of multicultural access fate chose offer. Thus so in this not easy tho rewarding aspect of mother tongue.
Thank you Hülya for your thought provoking poem!
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Your enchanting poem tugs at the heartstrings of they whose mother tongue, cultureally speaking, embraces more than one communicator, as in the languages of more than one culture’s tongue, as well as all aspects of their held influences.
Your touching poem gives substantial food for thought, and taste for we who have lived and appreciated the richness of multicultural access fate chose offer. Thus so in this not easy tho rewarding aspect of mother tongue.
Thank you Hülya for your thought provoking poem!
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Thank you, dear Jean-Jacques, for your precious comment! Throughout my life, I have taken this existential state of ‘in-between-ness’ as a challenge, not realizing that it also was a gift as far as attaining critical insights from multiple angles – insights into not only a different language but also a different cultural entity. At this late stage in my life, however, I embrace it as the unconditional giving that it is – regardless of the nostalgia I occasionally am flooded with regarding my home culture and home tongue.
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