Odyssey (Continued)

by Veronica Schanoes

6) Hades 2: Mistakes

"‘But no man, Achilles,
Has ever been as blessed as you, or ever will be.
While you were alive the army honored you
Like a god, and now that you are here
You rule the dead with might. You should not
Lament your death at all, Achilles.’ . . .

‘Don’t try to sell me on death, Odysseus.
I’d rather be a hired hand back up on earth,
Slaving away for some poor dirt farmer,
Than lord it over all these withered dead.’"

11.503–8, 510–513

All the withered dead that slip from my arms

are my companions of ten years of blood and isolation

All these withered dead

and not one face unknown to me

every shade my own

For ten years we ate and slept together

and killed together and bled together

We curled around each other

and made plans for the future.

I woke up under a pile of corpses

not quite dead. Yet.

And when this war is over

we'll wander across the world together.

We’ll get apartments in the same Brooklyn building

and leave the doors unlocked

so our children can run in and out all day

and we'll never know who’s having dinner where.

When we get old, among all the withered dead.

We were neon light trails, painfully bright,

winding around each other up First Avenue.

How can you leave me on my own in the dark?

No. I will not tolerate it.

I will stay here, rest here,

with you in the gray.

in the gray here it’s not . . .so . . .bad.

There's something crooked

for you to be gone and me to be . . .

A mistake, I think

I have become too old, I think

I have lived too long.

I see you and nothing else

I see the gray and no more

I will stay here, I think,

and make things right.

And who are you to tell me no?

Who are you, lording it among all the withered dead

to tell me, go back?

What right do you have, my love, my companion?

Not yet. Not here.

No. Go back.

No?

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