“Aeneas (But Never on the Tide)”

Continuing the proud tradition of bad automatic poetry generated in the rich creative environment that is the BART, here’s a piece seeded with the word “Aeneas.” Why yes, I am sensing a trend. This is what happens when you spend a semester translating but barely getting to talk about Latin: it comes oozing out the edges of your squishy subconscious.

—

“Aeneas (But Never on the Tide)”

Aeneas, my boy, who
told you not to stray from home
where no one knows you or could begin
to trickle toward
that offering?

You who always told me never
throw a stone when you see
a stone,
who told me never go running without knowing
exactly where my mind
might go and what it will feel like
tomorrow.

Aeneas, boy, who taught you
to talk to strangers? Beautiful strangers
are the things that walk between
the signs. But they will never love
you, boy. They will always want
to know where you
have been.

I bet, yes, I know the thing that went from you
when every other thing would stay.
Here, boy, is what I was meaning
to tell you before
the world
gave in:

I don’t know which way
the city fell. And this is what it looks like
for you tomorrow,
child, on the waves
but never on the tide.