Perseus

How many times I came to you after that battle,
after having snatched you from the jaws of Ceto,
closing the door behind myself,
slipping your key back into my bag
and kissing you fully against the wall,
sucking all of the salt from the oceans inside of you.

It was an unenforceable love:
epic, legendary love,
wet and full of celestial promise.

I used to leave offerings in Athena’s temple,
ever the good church boy,
but even the gods took note
of our poetry and crossed glances.

I thought I had saved you from the worst beast;
but there were paw prints leading away from your heart
that showed me true misery.

I was insistent on your distant attraction,
even when I had no right.
I kept you safe from every manner of danger,
save the lonely Greek night,
all lovely white sands run blue with the secretive moon and
distant Kraken bleats.

That was my fault.
I was so used to wielding the sword
that I cut you without thinking
every time I turned away.

I saw you watching the sea sometimes,
as if I weren’t there,
toweling off oracle tears and horse feathers
behind you.
We both know what you were looking for.

I have not loved you perfectly.
I have taken up unnecessary arms and battles,
kept telling you the next monster
would be the last.
I was supposed to be a king by now,
ruling men to keep heartbreak from
ruling my moves and breath.

It occurs to me that I never
asked you if you preferred the rock,
if Phineas was worthy of your sacrificial blood.
You did not cry when I turned him to stone,
but you did not smile when I turned to you,
Medusa’s head in hand,
my other extended,
you took.
I believed his stars were never meant
to rest alongside yours forever, but
there you were,
shore side, searching the waves.

We were both promised to others,
but I had the sharpest blade in the land,
and I wielded my sex with a scientist’s hand,
until the rock yielded its ghost and
the sea your love.

And I have missed you massaging away my vices
and playing sweet sweat games on my skin,
have longed to look at you from your lap as you pour
Pegasus milk into my sick mouth or
fed you a lunch of fried grape leaves and lamb
salted by the whisper of the sea.
You have doctored me.
Made me full when my heart hungered and moaned
in dungeons and sirens’ robes.

While I was out fighting monsters
I should have burned into my shield
how you opened your mouth at me
when I fleeced your love
from behind and above,
and considered that sweaty, manacle vision of your face
meal enough for the gods
and their dusty histories.

But instead I found you -
ruler of men -
chained to that rock.
And though I sometimes think
I should have saved the beast,
you made me every perfect thing I am.

Copyright 2007 - Scott Woods