"Let us all be from somewhere
Let us tell each other everything we can"
--Bob Hicok, "A Primer"

So listen, I was born in Illinois
and lived there while I became me
(the first time I became me)
Snowpants and the community pool,
rescuing half-drowned worms off the pavement in Spring

Illinois: Land of Lincoln,
Land of Capone
Land of dirt as dark and rich as chocolate cake
The state crop is corn,
The state flower
is corn, as well.
It is the state tree and also the state animal.
The state motto is "Hey, don't forget about Chicago!"

Don't worry, Illinois: nobody could.
The bean and the tower and hog butcher to the world--
And in the Field Museum, the bones of dinosaurs
threaded back together with wire as if to say
it all ends sometime

But I will never stop being from Illinois
It springs up in me like a flash flood
of feelings
about deep-dish pizza
or homesickness for a decent supermarket
or the catechism of early nineties basketball players
that still somehow flows through my blood

I live in Minnesota now
The skies are bluer, the newscasters blonder,
and in Winter the air is patently trying to kill you
I like the round vowels and the Nordic stoicism
but I miss being a local
and if I'm honest, I miss the dirt, too.

My children will not be from where I am from.
Which is sad,
except they never are, not really.
In the end, every where is a when, too.
I can only say, here is my where and my when:
snowpants and the community pool,
rescuing half-drowned worms off the pavement in Spring

The state bird of Illinois
is Michael Jordan dunking a basketball
and if you don't understand,
then I know you are from somewhere else.