“alas it is uncertain whether wife Creusa, snatched from wretched me
by fate, had stopped, or she wandered from the road or exhausted sat down…
I did not look back for her, probably lost and I did not turn my mind back to her.”
(The Aeneid, Book 2, 738- 741)
I am woman-vessel.
Making son, caring for
a father, not mine.
I am means.
The perfect woman
In my mindless action,
My blank maternal motions.
I excuse
And then spur forward.
When I walk, I follow
(Even in fire-stained streets
When humanity demands
Pace be quickened,
I follow and pause).
When I fail,
It is as means
Of country,
His country,
Never mine.
I fall, like so much
Ballast,
Cut away,
To lighten his load,
Lengthen his stride,
The perfect bride
In my execution of fate.
The story goes on,
Able because of
the part I played
And then
My Removal.