In Media Red

I stand at the mirror,
applying Rome. Rome never

the Rome I want, Rome enough
Rome of the thing

itself, my life raised
to its exponent, reddening

in the windchill, Rome under
the pale. I want

to call Rome out, to reflect
the light at such

and such a wavelength
like Rome, want to want

the length of wanting
without losing

wishing
for Rome avant

the coming guard,
warmth leaving

under a blue light.
The page reddens me

with knowledge
but still I apply

myself thus,
making Rome again

the wound
so easily pressed.

In a Roman Story

Rhea begets Remus,
begets Romulus. Or

is it Romulus
begets Remus, begets

Rhea Silvia? Narrative never
advanced the dead

nor the good-as-dead.
No one remembers

her back on his sweatshirt,
spread on the desk

in a ritual sacrifice. That wasn’t
what she wanted: she asked

to face the wall
to more fully be

-come the gate he sought.
Oh Mars, you mistook me

for someone
I briefly was. Girl alight

with impending loss,
vessel for bearing

out an arch
-itectural illusion. A wall

isn’t truly built
to exclude, but to instate

something worth defending.
A Roman on the road

is still a Roman, a god
in a mortal bed is still

a god. A woman
in prison is the very

definition of a woman.
You may read her

as the victim
or the villain, as it suits.

You fail to consider
a cell’s advantage:

structural conditions
made visible, physical.

And then he put her
on her back, and then

he said he loved her. He passed
through; the gate shut.