Scylla by Bex Hainsworth

A nymph unburdened by beauty is a nightmare.

My barnacle flesh scratches against stone

as I curl up in my cave, full of octopus cunning;

folding many limbs around myself, cruel, content.

This was Circe’s gift: to make me a monster,

a maneater. The distant roar of Charybdis

rocks me to an easy sleep each night.

I know they will take the dangerous road,

right to my mountain door. The men,

the soldiers, the heroes. The semi-divine.

They taste of revenge, of justice

for the ripped dresses, for the temple maids

who lost the chase, the dryads who couldn’t

get away, and the goddesses who never escaped.

For Leda, and Persephone, and Helen. For Hera.

This is for my own golden bruises.

I hold vigil. My teeth are tapers, glinting in the dark,

for all my sacrificial sisters. No offerings

are made in my name, no altars, no prayers.

No matter. The sea provides settlement.

You should hear them scream for me.

I rip the last words from their throats

with claws like scythes.

Afterwards, wiggling a thigh bone free

with the stick of a ship’s mast,

I recite my affirmations:

let them know how it felt beneath their bodies,

let their hearts freeze at the thought of me,

let them know what it is to be truly afraid.

A nymph unburdened by beauty is their nightmare.