I come from a land without borders
that people have carried on their backs
I went astray here,
and with my poems, I went astray there—
and here I stand, in terror and barrenness,
knowing neither how to remain
nor how to return.
– Adonis –
These lines are from Adonis’s poem Ulysses.
Ironically, my parents named me Penelope.
Not the one who journeys, but the one who stays, the one who waits ; when Ulysses’ drifting is precisely what I seek:
the errant road, the path that loses itself.
Across the earth, I search for a way home, a homeland beyond blood ties, a homeland within exile.
Poetry is the dwelling that belongs to no country, an atopía (a-topos) giving rhythm to these ceaseless returns.
Nomadic Poems seeks to open windows onto these wanderings I have cultivated for years along the road—
poetic apertures, whether written or visual.
Welcome aboard…