The Sand Hill Review http://www.sandhillreview.org 2009
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Happy Medusa and Reclining Sappho—In a side gallery of the It was like
waking in an Olga Broumas poem Colored girl
surrounded by Greek marble and
repressed desires. Or
a surprise—tumbling
into your two
muses at a cocktail party. You’d hardly
expect to recognize anyone you know. Each guest
is so big and famous they look
different close up and out of
context of book or picture I was angry
at the warrior holding her
huge head aloft As if the
simple dismemberment was triumph. How boy not to
notice that she’d turned him to stone. Eyes closed,
Medusa looked at me a subtle
undulation of the snakes around that
head and the soft
turn of her mouth pointed me toward the other. The two here
together—however captured— Unbowed,
unrepentant There,
Sappho supine Hardness
made soft like the Buddha by the craft
of draping stone, by the gaze—serene, searching. Her feet
outstretch from beneath her garments. One is the size
of my arm. Not the
diminutive or dainty thing biographers hawk. And that
bigness comforts me. One’s muse
should be supersize to channel
our fancies and stay in our sight. Sappho lay
back a short
distance from Medusa but always
in relationship, the line of
communication a laser between them. Sappho like
a warrior firm and
shapely one hand on
her breast knowing
Medusa always watched. Jewelle
Gomez |
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