You, who waited in Ithaca
patiently weaving a burial shroud
for your father-in-law
fending off lovers
while your smooth-talking husband
was sleeping his way across the seas.
You must have wanted a lover
of your own
maybe someone to amuse your son,
show him how to be a man.
Your journey spun upon a wheel,
this weaving
pulling together scraps of wool,
patching each day, making
a thing of beauty
and undoing it, only
to sew it again.
And this is where we stand:
in the doing and the undoing
Monk-like with sand,
setting the supper table
like a mandala,
each still life
not waiting for anything
in particular,
saying yes.
Original publication: Tampa Review, 55/56
