Mad Minerva by Steve Klepetar

Mad, Mad Minerva, by Salvador Dali, 1968

Mad Minerva

No, not wisdom born from the god’s brow,
this is helmeted rage and scent of battle
blood. How many times he rolled in his own
sweat, calling down the spring rains. His face
was thunder, his lips the parting of the sea.
She broke his skull from the inside out, pouring
through his pain. What did she whisper
as she passed through his nerves and blood?
Did she call him Father of my Spear, Giver
of my Glancing Gray Eyes? Or did she leap
from his brain with a shield and a thousand
stratagems, an amphora of oil and a cunning
net woven with skill from the sinews of the dead?

by Steve Klepetar

Steve Klepetar’s work has appeared widely, and several of his poems have been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net. Recent collections include My Son Writes a Report on the Warsaw Ghetto (Flutter Press) and Return of the Bride of Frankenstein (Kind of a Hurricane Press). Email him at [email protected].