The Mouse God

An owl teaches cats the art of catching mice. Unknown Lombard artist, ca. 1700.

“Hear me, you of the silver bow, protector of Chrysē

. . . , who rule with might over Tenedos—

 Smintheus* . . .”

—Homer Iliad 1.37–39

Say something, even if it’s only good-

bye! Humans’ bounden duty is to speak,

to come up with an answer. Yes, they can!

Apollo Smintheus, that lovely god,

whose temple is a house where mouse is man,

and Mickey gnaws the harnesses of time,

so well this serves: repeat and rhyme,

no matter multiplicity, things let stand,

the future’s snarl, the present's loopy band,

Minerva's bird's far-ranging beak,

Sminthe's foot upon a mouse, squeak! squeak!

Decapitating at the speed of light,

like the well-seasoned hack he is,

the Lord High Executioner says: “OK,

Just nod! Next time, you'll get it right!

Remember, you're the mouse; I'm the owl,”

spreading my wings in the falling dusk,**

but unpresciently—like Elon Musk!"

 *Smintheus, “an uncertain epithet, but most probably ‘mouse-god,’” Peter Green notes in his translation of the Iliad, from which I draw these lines (Oakland: University of California Press, 2015), 26n4.

**"The owl of Minerva spreads her wings only at the falling of dusk" / "Die Eule der Minerva beginnt erst mit der einbrechenden Dämmerung ihren Flug."—Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Grundlinien der Philosophie des Rechts (1821).

Sunday, February 15, 2026