When Odysseus opens his eyes she has been awake
for some time, stale devotion aging beneath her tongue
like a bad wine. Sitting on the edge of the bed, brushing
her hair, back unyielding, Penelope watches Odysseus
in the mirror. Feels his gaze on her hips with memories
of the witch-woman lingering in his eyes, recognizes
the shape Ithaca's coastline along his shoulders. When
she decides to get dressed she'll face the curve of his bow
hanging behind suits. Odysseus wanted it above the mantle
but she wished it broken, and thinks their marriage counselor
will see this compromise as progress. Odysseus rises
and moves to the bathroom, naked and proud, but she 
does not watch. In her head Penelope hears the noises he makes
near waking, caught between sudden echoes of seasickness
and still-reaching fingers of dead comrades. On those mornings
she lies quietly, tracing lines in the headboard made of wood lighter
than that of the olive tree. Hating their reputation. Without
notice she rises to start her morning, stepping over the unfinished
marriage shroud discarded at the foot of their bed. 


​~Jen Weber

Such a huge success! Thank you to all involved!

At the end of a crowded table
You stand, a proud, uncorked Montefalco Rosso,
A sinewy Italian red raised on an Umbrian hillside
Where Etruscans dined before the Romans ruled.
You are a hometown vintage, until recently a stranger to our American shores,
Smooth as silk with roots steeped in the soil of history.
Half-drunk, giddy with anticipation,
You have journeyed far to be with us tonight at our gathering.
You speak few words yet inspire all of us with your thirst for love and poetry.

Rosalind Resnick
​May 10, 2016 

My heart is a brewery
Your love is like fuel to me
Promise you'll always be true to me
And buy fancy jewelry
You are so goddamn cool to me
Never be rude to me
Your eyes are the blues to me
Your red lips breathe life to me
Your soul shines so bright to me
Doubt is never in your eyes to me
I'd cry if you shied from me
I'd die if you lied to me
Just joking, I know you'd never lie to me
Your wrongs are so right to me
Fire always burns ice for me
When your heart is so warm for me

I'll always be true to you
There's nothing I wouldn't do for you

You......don't love me?
That's news to me



​~Sam Marcus

​There is a place
Where I can go and float face-down
In a pool of silvery water
And swim to the bottom
Where the dancing coral grows.
Down on the ocean's floor
Where there is no sound,
I can hear myself think,
Safe from the world's noisy interruptions.
Down here time moves in slow motion
Yet millennia swim by in a flash like a school of glittering minnows.
Weightless, formless, untethered to the Earth,
I feel free, unbounded.
The years slide off me like shimmering dragon scales
And I am young again.
I look up and see the sun shining through the water.
Time to make my way back to the surface,
Clean and whole,
Re-emerging into life and light.
 
Rosalind Resnick
April 26, 2016