Les Troyens

the city not yet shielded in ice     the harbor not yet

frozen enough     to walk across     trees without leaves

prismatic    the thing no one

thought would happen     happened     in a vast hall

I watch the walled city made rubble

prophecy     everyone ignores       

women     who’d rather plunge knives

into their breasts     than be raped by the Greeks

the supertitles in clipped language

American English     it is a dress rehearsal     daylight

outside     impossible to banish

the day’s news from my mind     Cassandre

ascends the bulwarks     squints     the famed skyline

of her city in wreckage

a heap of dirty wood     dislodged stones

her soprano bombards the dark

no one believes the woman     then

94 choristers are singing in horror

Cassandre kills herself

the women follow

Énée (it is his story

now) flees the burning city

through the wings

as everyone scrolls through their phones

when the final three acts premiered

the curtain rose on an ancient time

the work scarcely stageable

impossible music     enormous orchestra

two full-scale ballets     an empire     holding on

in France     theaters built

along the widened streets     stripped of their shadows

while the dancers gyrated      mimicking

the animal     love

of the handsome refugee

and the noble Queen Didon

Énée seeks shelter     water to drink     a body to put his lust in

she is a stopping point

Didon drunk     she is helpless     she begs

the ships waiting

in the harbor     with their hundred oarsmen

the curved bow

enormous white sails      caught

in the stillness      the wind’s power     Didon

in a royal blue pant suit

Hillary had conceded     the hour before

and so it was Hillary’s

rage I saw     in Didon’s     her great American mezzo

pushed     to the limits