Meeting Alexander
You were the wonder of another age.
Enemies and friends alike: they learned
To love your laughter and to fear your rage.
It was your therapy when cities burned,
But if I somehow met you face to face
Such probing questions I would like to ask.
Yet I’m not Greek; it would not be my place
To see the man behind the golden mask.
Couches, back then, were just for relaxation:
You would allow nobody in your head.
You don’t owe me the slightest explanation
For those you left bereaved, enslaved, or dead.
But still I’d search for guilt, and an admission:
Olympias, your mother—she inspired
You, spurred you on, fed your ambition…
Was she the only woman you desired?
Psychoanalysis did not exist
When you brought empires down. Isn’t it strange:
For all your victories—it’s quite a list—
Yourself, you could not conquer, could not change.
David Whippman is a British poet, now retired after a career in healthcare. Over the years he’s had quite a few poems, articles and short stories published in various magazines.
My initial introduction to Alexander came from the movie Die Hard when Hans Gruber said that Alexander wept for there were no more worlds to conquer. Unlike Gruber, I did not have the benefit of a classical education. Since then, I’ve learned more about him and agree completely that there was something seriously wrong with him. Great poem!
Meeting, but not understanding. Or rather, understanding that Alexander the Great’s great problem must have been one shared by many throughout history: self-mastery. What needed to be changed? Impossible to say–this meeting leaves the unconquerable conqueror inscrutable. The speaker cannot speak Greek. The tools of psychoanalysis cannot be applied. David, you have many psychology expressions here: therapy, probing questions, in your head, guilt, admission, ambition, desire. And you suggest a diagnosis of early maternal dominance. That could have accounted for what a psychoanalyst might describe as Alexander’s unhealthy adult emotional life: no strong sense of self, leading to a compulsive desire to dominate others by any means. Still, it would seem that many men share the affliction without having Alexander’s military talents or achieving his political greatness. He or YOU (emphasized at the beginning of line 15) remains a mystery of personality and history. Excellent work bringing this forward in so few lines!