fragments in songs where your greatest rival is ever the hero
the blinking ash of a funeral pyre
elephant footprints in virgin snow
salted earth – six miles inland
in the end they were their own downfall as well (delenda est)
Spoiler! :
@PrincessInk - I don't really know yet! I have no idea why I chose this as a loose theme - we'll see how they go hopefully I can write poems with some Roman associations that are still relevant!! Or at least have fun with it.
"Stella. You were in my dream the other night. And everyone called you Princess." -Lauren2010
The word choice and formatting you've got going on so far seems so elegant - the fragmented/stilted structure for Carthage really fit well with the topic! I like the whole theme and will be curious where you take it.
Also the "delenda est" ending to the Carthage one was excellent; the whole poem felt like it was building more and more on it's ominousness.
you should know i am a time traveler & there is no season as achingly temporary as now
I just want to say that I’m really enjoying your poetry so far, there’s really something elegant and beautiful with them. I look forward to reading more c:
Previously Flite
'And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music.' ― Friedrich Nietzsche
the story they tell will be of loss. whispered tragedies – a daughter sold (as if others were not sold to worse) a body untouched (unharmed), a life lived in sisterhood instead of womanhood. the bricked-in girls who broke their vows.
tell, instead how far above them all we rise. the holy fire burns in every far reach of our souls. we have strength that men might only imagine. they would name us hearth witches did they not need our cleansing flame, did they not need us, lawmakers and treaty keepers, disguised as acolytes
bowed heads hide cunning eyes
there is no tragedy for a woman with a body sacrosanct, unviolated her character beyond the reproach of any but her goddess.
that story will not be told. a woman with power will still be a dangerous thought.
"Stella. You were in my dream the other night. And everyone called you Princess." -Lauren2010
yet i think it is us who have the sweeter life in narrow, bricked places, piled on top of one another sailors come from ostia with their musk and siren stories freedmen with lyres and better languages to teach
the sweetest life is here with you your worn-out sandals untied on the threshold our laundry hung and beaten outside amid laughing children from next door
here we will grow our little life around a dining table laid with olives are just as sharp as theirs, but the fish is fresher the wine is so heady it gifts you lofty thoughts but a kiss in the feathersoft candlelight reminds you that this is enough
"Stella. You were in my dream the other night. And everyone called you Princess." -Lauren2010
i hope you closed your eyes when you did it when you handed me over for that half-handful of denarii i hope you mind never comes to this strange place its shadow-damp winters bone ash summers
"Stella. You were in my dream the other night. And everyone called you Princess." -Lauren2010
that pretty vase your mother gave us the amber beads drip slowly like that summer that never ended in the trunk upstairs is my flame-orange veil that we so carefully folded up and stored for our daughter
all it takes to kill everything is one angry god
"Stella. You were in my dream the other night. And everyone called you Princess." -Lauren2010
they’ll never tell my story except as part of yours. it will never go beyond your eyes on mine – no longer narrowed by ambition but now as wide as a child’s, you saw the long sliver in my hand that you named betrayal. that will be my fate – your fate, the fate that we chose for you, not trusting the one you chose for yourself. that moment is my legacy – it earned me a seat at the darkest table, that last circle with the one they call iscariot.
they’ll never tell the story before that, how we fought side by side, those eyes of yours glinting in bloodlust and delight, arms tight around one another’s necks, wine that was too warm sitting in fly-ridden sunlight, hunks of stale bread you swore were sent by the gods. we came home to these urine soaked streets, the place we wished was nobler, confessed dreams on smoke-hazed nights like we were boys again, i loved your dreams – and then i didn’t.
the time came, i loved the idea of rome more – so there didn’t seem a choice, it was nobler. the crimson on your toga, i still felt it flooding my hands, your life spilled onto me, and i heard your last words every night when sleep evaded me – yes, it was me, by your side, as always, forever our histories entwined but now the end was vinegar, a sin unrepentable – and i realised rome was you.
"Stella. You were in my dream the other night. And everyone called you Princess." -Lauren2010
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