The Ladies of Horror
Picture-Prompt Writing Challenge!

Medusa’s Veil  
by Alex Grehy

.

Centuries I was awake, my anger

screaming through your mythology,

until all you remembered were the

snakes and the statues, a killer of men,

so fearsome you came to believe I deserved 

the undeath brave Perseus inflicted on me.

.

Oh so brave Perseus, equipped with

boys’ toys from his godly pals, 

who attacked a woman asleep,

a woman resting from the tortures

wreaked on her by the powerful – 

raped, marked, punished,

left beyond the reach of love, 

forever reviled,

forever feared, 

never healed.

.

I hoped for justice where there 

was none; my dismembered

head dragged into the light, 

brandished as a deadly threat, 

my power stolen by strangers, 

whether I willed it or not.

.

Centuries I was awake, for what?

.

I urge my snakes to coil into roses,

a diadem to hold the veil of sorrows

that falls over my eyes as they close 

on a world unchanged; my marble face 

less rigid than the predilections of 

the powerful, who, even now, fear the

strength of women, confining us with their

definitions of what is right and beautiful.

.

All gods fall in the end, 

but I am done with them.

.

I sleep. 

.

Fiction © Copyright Alex Grehy
Image courtesy of Pixabay.com

More from author Alex Grehy:

After a lifetime of writing technical non-fiction, Alex Grey is fulfilling her dream of writing poems and stories that engage the reader’s emotions. Her work has been featured by a wide range of publications including Siren’s Call, Raconteur, Bookends Review, and Toasted Cheese. One of her comic poems is also available via a worldwide network of public fiction dispensers managed by French publisher, Short Edition. Her ingredients for contentment are narrow boating, greyhounds, singing and chocolate. It is a sweet life, yet Alex’ original view of the world has led to her best friend to say ‘For someone so lovely, you’re very twisted!

Please click here to discover more!