Thanks. I'm glad you enjoyed the poem.

The moniker may not have been intended that way, but that is how we were taught to think of Alexander in school. It's the societal norm in the West to hail the "accomplishments" of Alexander and forget the on-the-ground reality or how non-West societies view Alexander and the Greek conquests.

Part of the point of the poem is that the larger conversation that conquerors have long been heroes under which veneer the conquered are forgotten. Alexander was chosen mostly because I'm married to a Persian. His historical perspective inspired the poem.