Penelope Waits for Her Wandering Lover

Penelope is weaving
in her towering hall.
She’s refuged up there in her loyalty.

Waiting for Odysseus,
she unwinds her youth,
and fashions it into his shrouding lace.

Her dark eyes cloud under sunlit lashes,
she feels again his fingers’
last brush against her hers.

Her spool flows thread,
like years untwisting,
like days she pours into remembering.

One day she’ll arrive at the end of her fibers,
all wasted passing time
till he wanders home.