my own ashes well kept
in a transparent urn
of heartwood and amber.
Shall I scatter them from a cliff
in Patmos or maybe in Corfu?
perhaps they might turn into a white trireme
sailing away to the sun. Perhaps
I'll be expecting so long for the arrival
that a war in Troy will break out again;
this time Priam would be the victorious one
and Ulysses crushed by his own wooden horse.
and Helen up to the creek sick of Paris
would end up jumping on the white trireme
seaworthy for the distant Egypt.
patiently patiently I'd be expecting: the world
has defeated me but not the freedom
of my wandering ashes.
