What She Told Me

I found her in a place
no one is supposed to go.

She said she wanted to touch
herself, alone, on a mountain

that overlooked the world.

I asked her if she wanted to make love
to a god.

She told me if she did
I would never understand.

I said you really do want
to be out there

beyond all perception, beyond time,
and the known.

She said you can come
here, too, but you need to stop

using the river
Styx in your poems.

I said you are a only
a myth, you live

on an island and sing
sailors to their deaths.

I do not need to listen to you.
She told me to go to hell.

I told her I had already been.
She told me there are no sailors

left on the water,
and the fish in the sea

are eaten by poets.

I told her I had to
say it that way.

I know.
She said.