Work Text:
Catullus, Juvenal, and Martial walk into a poetry reading. It's the kind with cheap wine and cubes of cheese on sticks, and the three of them, being the only anachronistic Roman poets in the room, end up hanging out together in the back.
Juvenal says, "I can't believe they call this poetry. Where's the meter?"
Catullus says, "We already know your views on poetry readings, J. Even I got through that much of your first book before I got bored."
Juvenal says, "Haven't you ever heard of a literary persona? Fictional characters speaking views contrary to the author's? Don't assume that everything my poems say is my express opinion."
Martial says, "If you two would shut up, this shit's hilarious. This is the third person in the reading to rhyme 'dream' with 'scream'. I'm holding out for a 'cream'."
Juvenal says, "Poetry about creaming is more your thing, isn't it?"
Martial doesn't look offended because it's hard to do unless you owe him money. Or he owes you money. That's how he rolls. "You'd have to talk to Mr. Sparrow about that."
"It was about a bird," Catullus says. "A pet bird. Literal. Bird."
"Sure, it was about a bird," Martial says, "and how you can't stick it in her anymore!"
Juvenal says, "Isn't that slang for a completely different time period than we're in?"
Then Martial and Catullus make him shut up, because they don't want anyone to notice they're in the wrong scene.
#
Catullus and Juvenal walk into a club on an amateur comedian open mike night, and take a seat in the back, because the only other anachronistic Roman poet in the room is already on stage.
Martial says, "So I told her, 'If you've been to his farm, you know I'm really talking about his figs!'" But nobody in the room laughs, except for the Romans in the back.
Five minutes later, Martial's gone through "Because she's coughing!" and a great riff on watered wine, but the routine's bombing. He finally leaves the stage in a huff, and finds the others in the back. "What's up with that?" he says. "I was great."
"You were great," Catullus says. "I don't know what's with this crowd."
Juvenal shrugs. "They don't have the footnotes."
#
Catullus, Juvenal, and Martial wake up in the morning together after a heavy night of drinking and bemoaning the state of the modern world where three respectable poets can't get enough of a loan to buy a decent condo. Juvenal's the first to notice the implications of how they're (not) dressed and all of them being asleep in the same room.
"Let's never speak of this again," he says.
Catullus wakes up enough to be coherent, looks around, and says, "What I want to know is who was on top."
Martial opens his eyes, and asks, "Anyone care what pseudonyms I use when I write about this?"