Erin Semple

There is a feeling that I get in the pit of my stomach. A nagging. An unsatisfied yearning for home. In Gaelic they call this cianalas.

I go home to my parents but, it is not my home anymore. Everything has shifted. It's a subtle change. A reminder that things change, move, go forward when you aren't there. When you aren't here.

Being in the land replaces the feeling in my stomach with a lightness, a rightness. This is home. But it is not my home. I have never been here for more than a few hours.

But, my family live here.

My family came from here.

I have memories that are not mine.

They lived and died on this land. They spoke Gaelic and worked this land. This was their land but it is not my land.

I̶t̶ ̶c̶o̶u̶l̶d̶ ̶h̶a̶v̶e̶ ̶b̶e̶e̶n̶ ̶o̶u̶r̶ ̶l̶a̶n̶d̶.̶

It could have been our land

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