Issue 15: David Hadbawnik
The Fury
For Richard Owens
from Book VII of the Aeneid
[Juno, seeing the Trojans happily settling in Italy, vows one last time to try to thwart them.]
1. flectere si nequaeo superos, Acheronta movebo
Juno stirs up shit in the form of Allecto
heart full of war
teeming with plots
anger crimes
even her own dad can’t stand her
her sisters hate her guts too
so many dark faces she has
hair hissing
with snakes
Juno says
“Hey! Give me my proper due, dark maid
this labor I ask
lest my honor be
broken my name
displaced – don’t let Aeneas
weasel his way into
an easy marriage
instead
arm brothers and whip them
to war under cover
of a thousand names and using
a thousand dark arts,
tear up the peace and sew
hatred, let men
starve and seize weapons
all at once.”
(on earth as it is in heaven)
Queen Amata stewing over the influx of aliens.
Allecto sends a love letter straight to
Amata’s heart, a serpent
that glides under her dress between
her smooth breasts
winding
in and down
breathes up into her
its poison breath
twists
round her neck and up into
her hair now gold
band licking
her lips
she trips
into the fire
(on earth as it is in heaven)
“HUSBAND”
she sighs, crying
“who is it sanctions this unholy matrimony
between Trojan riffraff and our dear daughter
Lavinia?
At the first stiff breeze
won’t he blow away?
Isn’t that how Paris
shuffled off with Helen
to Trojan towns?
What of the hand
frequently given to blood,
your Turnus?
What if word gets around your word’s
no good?
Trace anyone’s line far enough back,
there’s bound to be
foreign seed.
Won’t that
satisfy the prophets?”
(on earth
as it is in heaven)
Seeing the king unmoved
the worm turns
inside her, stretching into
every limb
synapses crackle
a top
wobbling
she spins through the city
and why not?
To the woods! playing at madness
for Bacchus
snatching her daughter
dancing wildly
paying homage to god
knows what
thus plucks
the promised marriage away
from Troy, quenching
the wedding torch.
“All you mothers!” crying
“COME
give cunts to the wind
if your husbands won’t listen
COME
with me and dance
justice
love joined
in orgy
for Bacchus COME
dance in the woods
(on earth as it is )
2. et tua Dardaniis transcribi sceptra colonis?
Allecto
seeing shit’s well under way
heads straight for Turnus and casting off
the look of the Fury puts on the face
of an old hag
nudges from sleep the youth
“Turnus”
she moans
“is it all in vain
your throne
transcribed
to Trojan castaways?
WTF?
Cock-blocked by the king
your wedding called off
in favor of illegal
aliens–
and the shitstorm gathers while you
sleep.
So rise and shine and
if King Back-on-his-Word doesn’t like it
let him taste your steel.”
Turnus:
“Fuck off, old woman.
You think I haven’t heard
about these cocksuckers
flooding the Tiber?
Go back to your temple
and let the men play at war
or peace as they please–
more importantly,
let me get some sleep.”
Pissed as hell
the Fury lets go of the old lady routine
and stands naked and awful
before him eyes
wild hair hissing
tits
up
in his
quavering
face
“Check me out
motherfucker
here’s what a real woman
looks like”
his cock
goes limp balls wriggle
up into scrotum
“NOW
what were you saying about
men and their guns and how I
should go back to my temple?
Check me out – I am
one of those sisters
THE FURIES
I hold
war fear
death
in my hand.”
3. de culmine summo / pastorale canit signum cornuque recurvo
The war’s pastoral. Pastoral’s
the war.
TURNUS
turns on, leaps to arms, men join him
this one for beauty, that for fame
rousing each other
“We’ll get laid, boys”
“They’ll sing songs about us”
“Pour oil and honey over our
war-scarred backs”
The Fury flies
now to the woods where
Ascanius
still seeking that money shot
to establish his rep
as a hunter
catches sight of
a great stag
(long-loved pet of Tyrrhus, shepherd
to royal flocks
(the war’s
pastoral)
trained to the touch
and knowing the way home)
lets fly an arrow the bitch-goddess
makes sure hits the target
“They’ve killed Precious!”
the cry goes up
“Who did?” “Trojan scum!”
“Alien fuckwads!”
“What are they doing here?”
(The war)
Allecto raises a rustic horn
belts out one
twisted note
that makes mothers’ milk go cold in their breasts
the rabble grab sticks
rocks
whatever feels good in the hand
swarm out for blood
(“Who did it?”) (pastoral)
Nor do the Trojan kids flinch
“It’s a melee!
“Abandon camp!”
telling each other
“Don’t bring a knife
to a gun fight!”
they show up in force
beautiful
sun
flashing on spear tips
shields, blades
throwing up light like
corn waving full in the fields
First boy to go down’s named Almo,
oldest son of Tyrrhus.
Bites an arrow that sticks
in his gullet and drowns
his death-cry in blood.
War for sure now and no one can stop it.
As bodies pile up Allecto flies
up to heaven and flashes
before Juno, boasting:
“Look what I’ve done! Try and bring them
to the peace-table now! I’ll do more, if you want, I’ll
tempt every neighboring town to step
into the quagmire, bog down the whole world
in war, scattering limbs in the fields, I’ll–”
“Enough,” Juno says.
“I’ll take it from here.”
David Hadbawnik is a poet, translator, and medieval scholar. His Aeneid Books 1-6 was published by Shearsman in 2015. He is the editor and publisher of Habenicht Press and the journal kadar koli, a co-editor of eth press, which focuses on creative interactions with medieval texts, and associate director of punctum books. Currently, he is an Assistant Professor of English at the American University of Kuwait
