Was it autumn when the Trojans lost their lives to the Greeks?
When they wheeled the beautiful wood-carved horse,
Twice as tall as the Trojan's fort,
Into the welcoming homes,
The opened gates, as a gift that would end the war?
Ah, such a miserable deception.

Even as a child,
It was the first story that impressed me.
They slaughtered old Grandfather Priam
And left him for the dogs,
Like pigmeat.
They raped the girls, enslaved their wives,
But when they dragged the little boy into the gold-dust air
For the final execution, a sound rose
With such pain, anguish, that no one could move,
Every bird, man, child, held still,
As the sound rose and circled the wind, a long
Way up, higher and over the blood-
Stained tides where it turned into a circling hawk
Above the hollow fortress.

This much I remember as a child.
And my mother who warned,
Suffering opens the eyes to truth...

But as I was saying,
Autumn is a season for reflection,
A road, winding down the coast,
Orchards, and many acres of wheat.

Inland, the cornfields stretch for hundreds of miles,
And I dreamed of green throughout the night.
Maybe it was the beginning of day, the afternoon?
Either way, I was lonely.

The hills curved like a slow bend, like the naked shoulders,
The golden summer of a girl asleep.
How I would like to walk that road between the hills
And the confusion of autumn.

I can't help thinking
What if the beautiful wood-carved horse
Had been a gift
Instead of that miserable deception?