Sees the lids lift off a thousand eyes
to scan the same reptilian memory through
a thousand geometric perspectives:

the infusion of sea water into the unlocked chamber
between her thighs, the lance of aching darkness
piercing her shield of chastity,

redefining the definition
of all she is; all she was, cleanly washed away
by one towering wave.

Pleas for sanctuary, prayers for healing
answered through the wisdom of a goddess
sowing snakes

in place of burnished hair;
let all men beware
the vengeance of this newly hybrid beauty.

Still, what woman could endure
such drenching, lunar-pulled love, unchanged?
Each serpent uncurled green and phallic

from the dreadful eggs incubated
in the sweltering nest of her mind, a basket
packed to splintering through one Olympian

encounter. Everlasting peril to the amorous sons
who would approach her, hazard to the heroes
who would take her down; this pedestal’s height

exceeds all skills of siege.
All beauty and terror, all horror and delight,
are met with her, the woman

of the gray sea shuddering
with unspeakable treasures
sunk beneath it.

[Hillary Lyon is editor for the small press poetry journals The Laughing Dog, and Veil: Journal of Darker Musings. She holds an MA in Literature from SMU. Her work has appeared recently in Red River Review, Scifaikuest, and Red Fez. She lives in Southern Arizona.]