Busy Waiting

Penelope

weaving/unweaving

(Lady of Shallot, Prisoner of  Chillon)

waiting for Life

to come home

from the sea.

Leif the Lucky, Eric the Red:

seafarers!

Did they each have someone,

lady-in-waiting

who languished, anguished

so patiently?

Then love me and leave me!

I’ll make it alone!

(Helen launched

all those angry ships,

not one of them her own,

emboldened by her golden-ness.)

Before the Fates’ great

scissors snip my thread

I’ll spin my own yarn,

tell it my own way,

weave my own life instead.

I’ll chart my own course

on inner seas,

unfurl my own sails

in freedom’s breeze.

And if I meet Her

(I might find Circe yet!)

I won’t tie myself to the mast

(now that I’m finally untied!)

I’ll welcome Mystery,

embrace a fearsome Change,

brave enough at last

to act heraic in Hera’s name!

(Weaving/un-weaving the universe,

knitting, netting, knotting fate,

what return does She await, but thanks?)

© Tamara Rasmussen 2018