The Homecoming

By Kate Lewis

THE HOMECOMING
A Penelope Sonnenizio

The first to love, the first to lie like this –
Tales of monsters, myths, excuses to lie
In an island’s warm sun, lie and linger
For ten more years, lie and lose the lives of
every man on board, lie and lose the loves
of the women, all Ithaca allied
against you, their trust destroyed. I believed
in you – now you greet me with lies, disguise,
praise my resilience, expect a hero’s
welcome and relief. Where was mine? All those
years, keeping our kingdom unsullied and
safe, raising our son alone. Believing
you lived, I kept the faith, ignoring lies.
You bring more. Unbelievable. Unwise.

****

Navy spouse Kate Lewis’ writing appears in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Good Housekeeping, Men’s Health, Military Families Magazine, and more. For a decade, she served military families through PR work for veterans’ organizations, bringing light to struggles on battlefields and at home. She is a Perry Morgan Fellow at Old Dominion University, writing a collection inspired by Penelope’s role in The Odyssey and invisibility in The Iliad. Find her online @katehasthoughts or at her Substack newsletter, The Village.