Word Problem

Daughter of the clearest eyes,
Named for that divinity
With clouded eyes, the goddess

Of the proud Athenians—
Of wandering, war, wisdom,
And too-proud Athenians—

Is struggling with her math quiz
On her laptop asking her
For greatest common factors,

And you think that teaching her
Such things amounts to wisdom
Since, like most older adults,

You’ve come to equate wisdom
With frustration—an excuse
For coming to nothing but.

You should tell her her namesake,
Unlike the town named for her,
Was never long frustrated,

Was wily and got her way,
Enjoying orchestrations
Of the absurd dilemmas

Of lying, blood-soaked humans.
To be human is to be
Frustrated for some fiction.

To be divine is to be
A fiction of a fiction.
The common factor’s fiction.