Odysseus Returns

This is the sixth and final part of my Odyssey retelling The Return.

Part 1: Penelope Waits Part 2: Telemachus Schemes Part 3: Calypso Sings Part 4: Eurylochus Laments Part 5: Athena Watches

 

Odysseus Returns

 

After Troy fell

it was a rough journey home

much longer than I expected

 

in the end I was alone

when I saw my island again

 

every day I had dreamed

to return to the rocky shores

of my kingdom

 

to see it’s olive trees & quiet bays

& wander the long hill-paths

 

she held me captive for years

& slowly I fell for her charms

but she let me go & I sailed

the oceans paths home

 

when I return no one recognises me

but once the parasites in my house

were dispensed with

I was king again

 

with a people I no longer recognise

or understand

 

a young man calls me father

watching me intently with every step

 

& my wife

is not her

not the woman I left

 

she has erected walls within walls

I cannot find my way through her labyrinth

she kept suitors out of our bed for so long

she has grown used to the solitude

 

every night I dream

I am lying on the white sand

listening to the waves rolling lazily ashore

& she is there

standing over me

softly singing

while a breeze blows through

her long brown hair

 

then I awake

it is still dark

& I hear my wife

muttering in her sleep

next to me

 

I know it is going to be

another long day

 

 

Joanne Fisher

 

Well that’s all folks! In a couple of months I might put all the parts  together and post it in it’s entirety. Over the weekend I plan to write an article about how I came to write this sequence.

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