and ashes of the life
I used to know.
Womanhood
Pallas had once asked Styx, when he thought I was not listening, whether I would ever become a woman. It may have occurred to them that perhaps keeping my abilities from me was stopping me from becoming the Goddess I was meant to be. I felt as though I had been trapped as a girl for a century. But the moment I left the rubble of the palace Styx and Pallas had built me and Thanatos asked me where I wanted my new home to be, I knew. It would be at the banks of Mnemosyne. Close to the Realm of Night, but not quite within Nyx’s territory. Close to Thanatos’ own palace, but not too close to him either. Easy enough for Charon to reach, but far enough that I would have my solitude to work on the gifts of my godhood. Thanatos told me on our journey there that the love I had of mixing herbs and potions was actually another facet of my power. He called itmageia. Magic. And he said I was either apharmakis, a maker of potions, or anaoidos, an enchantress. Too little was known ofmageia; among the Gods, only my mother knew how to practise it. This practice too was a threat to the order of the Gods. I was starting to feel as though my entire existence was a threat. Perhaps this was what womanhood was. The dangerous knowledge of who you are and what you could do with that power if pushed.
A New Body and Home
I would not have noticed it,
I was so busy building
my own palace on the shore
of Mnemosyne, collecting bones
and crystal-like memories
to make way for my new home.
It simply happened that one day
I was standing next to Thanatos
as we built my palace
and then I realized,
he no longer towered over me.
Instead, we stood almost
shoulder to shoulder,
willing the white marble
to settle into the earth’s crust.
A grand wooden kitchen
full of everlasting food.
A white marble and
obsidian hall to greet guests
and play dice.
But my favoured room,
the one I loved most,
was in the onyx tower
that rose through the earth’s crust
into the land of the living.
