Persephone to the Other Husband

Almost as soon as we got to Greece, the first evening

on the island, I tried to go back to you and our life.

Did it wrong. Made the same mistake as others,

confusing that home with death. Went to the graveyard

instead of the door opening back. I had become

ordinary again. Cats on the path fled away from me.

The sky was red and the world darkening. Thistles

shoulder-high were black against the silver Aegean.

I was going to steal a clay pot for your memory,

but the gate was locked. I looked through and discovered

candles lit in niches high on the gravestones.

Small lights shining among the cypress trees

as if for me. I saw how seriously they took the dark

and gave up. Went back to my new life. Past the prison

at the edge of town. Between two houses for the poor.

I stole a rose that grew over the wall of the villa

to give my husband in the house where I live now,

an apology for the unfaithfulness of this longing

after the dear mystery of owls in that different night.

Notes:

This poem is part of the folio “Linda Gregg: Never Give Up Longing,” curated by David Semanki, and was published in the spring 1987 issue of Antaeus. It is published by permission of the Estate of Linda Gregg. Read the rest of the folio in the April 2026 issue of Poetry.

Source: Poetry (April 2026)