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I was born to hold
Everything together,
But look at this state of affairs!
A brother better left for dead
Whose penis has launched
More triremes than Hermes can count.
A false warrior whose brilliant disguise
Robbed me of my final triumph.
A goddess who claims she’s got my back
But whom I simply don’t trust.
And now today my family
Watch me trudge out before the walls of Troy
To meet my doom:
A father whose faith in me
Is as oppressive as this Anatolian sun,
And a wife whose adoration of my calves
Is, frankly, embarrassing.
Look! There he stands now, my reckoning, 
Those deep green eyes flecked with gold,
His swagger my death warrant.
There’s always someone just that much better.
He’s waiting, radiating ruin, but
It occurs me to that somewhere a simpler man,
Innocent of royalty,
Wages daily war with the soil
To grow the wheat and barley for his porridge.
Before his next mouthful,
I will be fodder for carrion. 

About the Author:

Paul O. Jenkins lives nearly completely in the past. His scribbling has found homes in various literary publications in the USA and Europe.