Prologue

 

Between Echo and Nemesis

Who will answer?

to the beautiful son of blue rapture
who commands:
give me a mirror
give me a body
of water to plunge myself into

Who will answer?

as I, in my agelessness,
have seen, perhaps,
the snaring of a thousand stags

Who will answer?

a prayer to the gods
when I have a plague placed
by Juno on the tongue. And what
is it that I can offer? When I speak
of horrible nothings.

And what will they avenge?

when he is numbed from the hunt
and I am scattered against my wishes
navigating the real world,
its slants of light, as nothing but breath.