The Burning of the Great Library of Alexandria

Poem for the week of January 30, 2024

Photo by Brendan Stephens

The Burning of the Great Library of Alexandria

i. tabula rasa

Blackboard chalk
hung in our throats
cloyed on our tongues
we worked out the math
of what goes into
long division.

ii. à deux

Speak in tongues
with me in the dark
drink the Willamette wine
until our words are curled
like snakes intertwined 
at creation.

iii. modus vivendi

Intermission
is no time to recall
what came before us or after
our breaths rise and fall
a Carthage of our own
unmaking.

iv. en fuego

In the end
I’ll burn the books 
for warmth more than light
I’ll have no patience for words
hanging as indefinitely
as chalk dust.

v. de profundis

I reveal 
to you at last
the great coup de grace
this will never be yours
nor your memory
to restore.

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There’s not much more to say. Scraps lost in the fire, and all that. But you never know if you are Aeneas or you are Dido.

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