Penelope and Circe Consider Contentment
Next to the boathouse I take the same photo I’ve taken for years. It’s the same, C says.
She points her camera straight into the purples and golds and takes the same photo again too.
C’s kids are in the cabin, unmoved by the close of day. The puzzle solved, the meat grilled, just the sound of
outboard motors and bodies sluicing into the river. Everywhere water, a silvery blue, straight to the bottom.
We’ve come this far. The river pulsing beneath the dock. Long ago we pulled ourselves
together hoping for some delicious misery. Now our flaws, deep and unhide-able.
The stars like the suitors with wide set eyes and wine-stained lips forming their own
constellation. I dressed the bed, left loose threads from my dress. Each night the same.
When two men appear, green eyes, graying beards, an old dog over the bow sated just enough.
Mary Lou Buschi (she/her) is the author of 3 chapbooks and 3 full length poetry collections. Her 3rd book, Blue Physics was published in February 2024 (Lily Poetry Review books). Paddock, her second book, was also published by LPR. Her poems have appeared in literary journals such as Ploughshares, Glacier, Willow Springs, On the Seawall, among many others. Mary Lou is a graduate of the Warren Wilson MFA Program for Writers and holds an MS in Urban Education from Mercy University. Currently, she is a special education teacher working with students on the spectrum in the Bronx.