Alexander at Granikos

( by Nick Mancuso )

You wept at Granikos
wept at the site of the
spear-won land
head tilted towards
further conquest

the flute players
tickled your fancy
and when the women
came to make libations
you were unimpressed

what divine honors had you
saved for yourself? was it
the lands beyond asia minor
when you walked by the
colonnaded avenue of your
divine city holding hands
with athena and nike?
was it the westward lands
beyond reach

june 10, 323 b.c. in Babylon
you died mute & talkative
Roxanne was pregnant
and that mental defective brother
of yours Arrhidaois incapable of rule
you gave your ring to Perdikkas
ordered your body to be taken
to Ammon, one-eye got central asia
and the factions, made plans to six
great temples built at key sites

founder indissoluble, now white marbled
your clouded brow, leonine,
skopaic your deadly stance
armed with aegis and thunderbolt, with horn and mitra
crowned by Ge, personifier
of the earth itself what eastern
sarrapin could stand up to you?
alexander?

in your honor snakes were fed
at the household altars
spear in hand, you were not wood
and stone but realer somehow
in deaths gripped bud so surpassing
in excellence and power as to be
a god among men your tutor
said, son of all-knowing Zeus
Hegemon, Basileus, Arche.....

Lion Man
were you?

not performed,and the exchange of
populace between europe and asia
not performed
so many plans, your body mummified
protected by two golden lions
so many plans lost

and golden acanthus, and 64 mules
to pull your death chariot, spectral,
a golden veil about your face
you sitting upright, splendid sceptre
in hand,what a sight that must
have been, Alexander
your sybaritic body in the haloed lights
of twilight!

the silver shields stood guard
a joyful hearse announced
your passage to the underworld
what were we mortal men to think
of such a sight?
you always rode into battle first

you impersonated the gods, your titles
endless, averter of evil, in an elephant
drawn chariot, i wonder what your
tutor must have thought, ruler of the
world, rëam-horned, focuser of the worlds,

you sacrificed to Protesilaos
throwing your spear
from ship to shore
to receive the homage of the waves
before the battle at Issos
to Thetis, Nereus, Nereids, Poseidon
like Achilles your predecessor
abstaining from sex and sleep
ever to be best and excel in all things
for Arete'
entered the house of Death.