Medusa
by William Bolcom
Text by Arnold Weinstein
I. The Hag on the Crag
COME SEE THE MONSTER MEDUSA!
I GUARANTEE SHE’LL PRODUCE A JOY
ANY MAN’S VISION CRAVES.
COME SEE HER NOSTRILS FLARE
LIKE A PAIR OF OPEN GRAVES.
SEE THE TONGUE LAP THE LIZARD-SKIN CHIN,
SEE THE GUMS HANG IN FESTOONS
FORMING THE BARRACUDA GRIN
OF THE MEDUSA.
Come see the monster Medusa,
look, listen and gasp
at the serpents coiled in her curls,
the adder and the asp;
listen to the hissing,
you don’t know what you’re missing
till you hear reptiles reminisce
about dear desert days
before their exile to the hair,
the writhing, crawling hair of the Medusa.
SEE HER CRIES POLLUTE THE SKIES,
SEE HER CRUSTED EYES, BLOOD RED
AS THOUGH A SEAHAWK HAD BEEN FED,
LIKE NOBODY YOU EVER KNEW.
LIKE NOTHING YOU EVER DID VIEW,
COME SEE THIS MONSTER MEDUSA,
THIS GRUESOME MUSE OF UGLINESS,
THIS DEFORMED ENORMITY
WHICH IN THE SWEET USED-TO-BE
IS NOT AT ALL WHAT SHE WAS
BEFORE THE FALL OF THE MEDUSA.
II. In Athena’s Temple
Time was, of all the vestal virgins in Athena’s temple
Medusa was the most devoted and most lovely.
When the gold of her hair caught the light of the sun
Everyone was captured.
When she lit the lamps her face was crowned
With a beauty so profound
Young and old, shy and bold
Crowded round, enraptured.
Tongues of desire flickered in eyes,
Even the eunuchs’ tunics would rise;
One could safely say
No man came to the temple to pray
But to sing love’s perennial psalm.
Cold and calm she walked away.
Till one day the great god Neptune
Sang to her the same inept tune:
“You don’t mean to say
That you devote each day
To the virgin goddess
In that skimpy bodice.
And that floor-length sunlit hair!
It’s unfair!”
He also sang off key.
She responded respectfully:
“I know this is the move men make
But a god must know my soul’s at stake.
As Athena’s vestal virgin I
Would rather die
Than break my vow.”
Neptune was more excited now.
“Tender virgins like you, child,
Drive us Olympians wild, child,
With your exquisite golden hair,
Fairer than gold, and more rare, child.”
III. The Rape
Suddenly with sinewy muscle and breath like flame
Neptune became a stallion and tore
Into the virgin on the pristine temple floor
While Athena, the goddess of wisdom and war,
Hid behind her shield
In divine disgust and jealousy
As she watched the virgin yield
To the mighty lust of Neptune.
He triumphantly shook his mane
And giving his nose a snort
Returned to his myriad nereids
Corralled in his coral court.
IV. The Sentence
Envy burned Athena’s reason.
She turned the child into a deformed woman
And ordered Vulcan:
“Stop sulkin’ over the Venus and Mars affair
And forge me a pair of claws of brass
To replace the devoted hands
That lit votives to me.”
Then she had Vulcan hammer out fangs for her mouth,
One going north, one going south.
And as for Medusa’s golden hair
Athena placed serpents there.
Now crawling, writhing creatures
Wreathed her pug-ugly features.
But Athena knew that even then,
Men being men,
They’d sooner hug
A sagging dug
Than spend a night alone.
So Athena put into Medusa’s glare
The stare that turned men to stone.
V. The Expedition: Scena
Medusa, bewildered and ashamed
Of what she was blamed for,
Terrified that her family would be petrified by her look,
Marooned her lonely loathsome self
To a crag on the ocean shelf
And wondered and waited.
The goddess Athena was not mistaken:
Expeditions were undertaken.
Boats came, kept coming,
The twenty-four oar man-o’-war slumming
To hear the hair hiss
And the brass claws clack,
To see from afar
The raging stare of petrifaction ready to attack.
Even the farmer
In second-hand armor,
Sword and dagger,
Look at him swagger
Like a bowlegged Hercules,
Ready to brave the seas
To see the Medusa.
“Sail, sailor, don’t be slow,
Sail and see who runs the show.
Not the captain or admiral or
Surely not the man behind the oar,
While Neptune’s down in his watery harem
Having an after-orgy snore.
“Farmer, give your shield a shine
You’re a stoic, you’re heroic,
Sail to me. You are mine.”
VI. The Storm
And Medusa called on the sea,
The mother of all things,
To bring on a typhoon,
And a typhoon struck!
Ships went under, the sea went amuck.
The sky cracked open, fore and aft,
And port and starboard flew apart.
The wind was captain of the craft,
The rain was master of the master’s art.
The storm hit harder, a timber snapped.
Then one big wave slapped the whole fleet down,
Making a great sarcophagus of bones
Of men who became their own tombstones,
Having looked into the eyes
Of the Medusa.
Hear a lament of a hero for his life,
a faithless husband for his wife.
Hear the despair that rang through the air,
How it was music to Medusa of the hissing hair.
In the eternal necropolis below
Fish with eyes on the side of their head
Eternally watch a stone dead farmer,
Watch the rust grow on secondhand armor.
Back home, a sweetheart of the fleet
In blissful ignorance embroiders a sheet;
On it is the face
Of the Medusa.
VIII. After the Petrifaction: Scena
“Thanks for the look, boys, I needed that.
Orpheus, you had to look back.
Oedipus, you had to scour the country.
When will men’s eyes ever learn to behave?
I need a well-deserved wash, now the water is quiet.
Neptune left behind a mess only gods can make.”
“Look at my writhing reflection:
Frightened, frightening thing.
Poor scary thing, myself, I’m scared.
But I still have my hate to keep me hot.
Being screwed by a god and a goddess, and a stallion
Puts a girl in a pretty bad mood.”
Aria
“When the fires on the distant shore die down.
Dawn coming in; all darkness done,
I for one must prepare
To blow your breath out with a stare.
How time passes since I’m trapped in immortality!
Eternal life is too long to live without revenge.
When the fires on the distant shore die down,
Dawn coming in, alt darkness done,
I for one must prepare
To blow your breath out with a stare.
“Climb aboard. hero, haven’t you heard:
Hunger is the new beauty?
Here’s your chance, hero,
Meet the girl with the withering glance, hero!
HERO, YOU ARE MINE!”
IX. Trio: A Beating of Wings
“A beating of wings.
Who’s there?
Not a normal sightseeing snoop
Swooping on the spit-white dawn.
Looks like a hero trolling for a dragon.
One look, hero, you’ll go under,
A monument to make fish wonder.
You’re very formal, hero,
With your shield all ashine, hero,
You’re divine, hero.
I like you.
Don’t look at me yet. Not yet.
I promise you ecstasy
Next to me.
Glide through me.
Slide through the slimy fog
To love.”
X. Perseus
Lurking in the wings is a story
Common as Queen Anne’s lace:
A story of another god raping
Another pretty face.
Jove came to our hero’s mother
In a shower of gold
Of loving liquefaction.
(At least that’s the tale she told.)
And Danae gave birth
To Perseus the fatherless
Who will offer Medusa’s head
To a king who will marry his mother.
(Any good son feels it his duty
To give his mother a King-sized bed.)
The gods are family.
Athena gave Perseus her shield.
Hermes gave him a sword
To slice off the head of Medusa
And a pouch to hold it in,
And the address of the cave
Where lived the three grey ladies
Who had the only remaining map
That led to the Medusa.
In a twilit cave the three grey ladies.
Dino, Enyo, and Perphrido,
Had one grey eye and one grey tooth among them:
Dino, Enyo, and Perphrido.
One eye, one snaggle tooth they passed one to the other.
Perseus flew down to the cave
Where he told the ladies his tale of woe.
Fatherless boy who yearns for legitimacy.
But how without Medusa’s head?
The grey ones wept,
Passing their one eye
To each other to share their tears.
They would show him the way
But the map had to stay.
But swift Perseus grabbed the one weeping eye
And refused to return it
Until the ladies gave him the map.
He swore he’d bring it back.
They’re waiting still.
XI. Perseus Approaches
With the pouch, magic sword, and map,
Perseus flew to Medusa.
“Watch him circling around me.
Welcome, hero, have a seat.
Bite to eat?
My crustaceans can’t be beat.
Have a drink,
Snap a seaweed bubble.
Close your eyes,
Don’ t take the trouble to think.
FEEL!
My body is finger-lickin’-fine.
It’s yours. Everything is yours, yours.
All the colors of the rainbow, yours.
My thighs across the horizon, yours.
My scaly gown of skin is yours.
The human heart that beats within is yours.
Breathe deep. Dive in.
Love somehow lives in me.
Love I never knew could be
Till you flew by.
Take the kneeguards from your knees!
Take the breastplate from your breast!
Let me breathe into your ear
Inspiration you’re the first to hear.
Many have sailed,
Tried me and failed,
Every century or so,
Only to sink below.
But you, my wandering sea hawk,
You’ll go home safe.”
“Ah! How gracefully
He circles to me!
Now, flying straight at me.
But with his back to me!
Looking in the mirror of his shield,
With his back to me!
Backward, backward, backward, with his sword
Beheading me!
Slicing through my neck,
Pouring my blood on the ground!
Pouring my head into a swarming pouch,
Holding it high!”
XII. Finale: Pegasus
Flying toward royalty.
The assassin disappeared with the swarming pouch held high
As it whispered:
“WHAT A SHAME. WHAT A SIN.
YOU AND ME, WE COULD HAVE BEEN
HERO AND HAG, TOP OF THE CRAG…
WHAT A DRAG.”
From the blood of the dying Medusa
Came fluids that heal
And venoms that drive men to war.
The last thing she heard
As she floated away
Was the hooves of Pegasus,
Born of her blood and the earth,
As he galloped
Toward the sky.
From his hooves in the puffy clouds
And the snakes hissing in her hair,
From these, Athena invented the art of music.
