Mythic

Was there any inside the horse,

or were Odysseus and his men

packed in like sardines?

How much between Achilles’s heel

and Hector’s corpse?

Did Helen find breath inside the burning wall?

Or did the smoke, noxious fumes of defeat, suffocate her

until a mortal would sputter and choke?

Calypso has more than anyone could ever, under any circumstances, need—

an entire ocean away from her closest cousin.

Persephone knows, runs away from it when the first frost falls,

safely sequestered in the underworld,

where need itself is dead

and pomegranate-devouring souls

dance through the darkness,

more absent than the place

where desire grows.