← v11n2, Fall 2012Poetry · Volume 11, Number 2
The Tomb of the Scipios
They sleep fitfully, we hope,
in their tufa bedrooms, so old-fashioned
they lie down instead of ascending
in proper plumes of smoke.
What are they
up to, the living ones, in their Greekified gardens,
their scroll-crammed libraries? Who are those
bookworms Aemilianus hangs with?
The best porphyry sarcophagus couldn’t keep
the slimy suck-ups out.
O, Appia, vilest of beasts
to the traveled foot, take us safely home.
We know our eyes should never leave
your hard, black stones.
