The Quiet Softness (of a penis sighing). New poem in Gargoyle

See below for credit.

The Aeneid has been one of my occasional purse books over the past few years. That means I toss the Allen Mandelbaum-translated paperback in my purse and read on the bus or subway; when I'm in a waiting room or waiting for room. Easy breezy. I've read it before so if I skip around or stop reading altogether (temporarily--there is always tomorrow's or next year's purse book), no problem.


Truthfully, no problem even if I hadn't previously read the book. Beginning to middle to end is not one of the Ten Commandments.  Anyway, this latest run got me about a third of the way through, and also a new poem, "The Quiet Softness."


Richard Peabody graciously selected the poem for inclusion in the just released Gargoyle 57. There are many many other writers in there, wonderful and more wonderful, and I'm not going to name one of them. 


I include these lines as a teaser (not spoiler).  Excerpted from "The Quiet Softness" (oh, by the way, "she" is Queen Dido, who built Carthage, a plus, but made some bad life choices).

                         Forgetting rapture in

the arms of an accomplished heart  
or the quiet softness of a penis  
sighing, Aeneas sailed his cock  
to Rome, leaving her in Carthage,  
the city of her breasts stomach  
hips, configurations of the universe.

The photo is from
http://supphire.files.wordpress.com/2010/02/ds05_dido_and_aeneas_orig1.jpg and is titled, Dido, Don't Think of Me.

( poem from, again, "The Quiet Softness," my contribution to Gargoyle 57)