Medusa’s soma falls into the Aegean, almost into the fatherly arms of Phorcys, almost close to the sobs of her sister gorgons, their monstrous grief now deformed into the cursed shriek that is human terror, that is the horror of all human existence.
Her soma’s splash releases a thousand stars upward to the moon.
Perseus looks away lest the Ohia viper curls held high to the sky and slithering on his right arm turn him to stone. Still, a side glance fossils his heart.
He will abandon his wife. He will abandon his consort. He will abandon himself.
In disgust he will toss Medusa’s visage to the heavens for Athena to catch and plant on her shield.
Below, Medusa’s soma releases an incarnadine flow, birthing a herd of frys. The young seahorses bob to her collum forming a red fin at Phorcys’ command.
Gently the fin will swim down, gently a school of aqua leaf fish will form a regal cushion until she settles a red anchor on Phorcys’ soft belly, that body that is the Aegean Sea floor, the once crib now her crypt.
The frys will sail to the surface an equine cloud that breaks into a glorious white, the white that is Pegasus flapping his wings to meet the arch that will harness him to Apollo’s sun chariot.
Phorcys commands the red weight to form pods of lobsters. In the dissolve a light pours forth from Medusa’s heart.
Perseus sees a glint break the surface and the trireme that will sail him home being formed, and behind, the Argo of Jason, the black sails of Theseus, all those who sailed to Troy, including Odysseus’s dozen, all those doomed to war and adventure.
In the distant mire below the Three Fates appear, their threads flowing in the bright ebb forming halos.
Sea stars and florescent moon fish sprout from Medusa’s collum. Phorcys unable to hold the squirming mass of life commands it to be still.
It becomes silent, flattens itself, develops gills and sea wings, a stinging tail.
It’s beautiful and fierce, full of everything Phorcys loved in his daughter.
He watches with pride as the stingray effortlessly floats away from him into the brightness of her new kingdom.
