Io

Part One

When I was a girl

With skin white as milk

I would walk through vast and palatial halls

My head bowed in silent reverence

Alone in Acropolis

When I was a young woman

I offered counsel to Queens

‘Io’, they called me

Humble and beloved

The Virgin Priestess

One day I saw a man

More powerful than any I’d ever laid eyes upon

He was whispered to be a great King of the sky

And the marble floor cracked beneath his feet where he walked

He had thick dark curls that hung loose around his shoulders

A tangled beard and wild looks

And eyes that burnt into me

Waking a storm in my heart

He came to me in my dreams

Visions of golden fields

Growing rampant and procreant

Of limbs and moans

And the wild, fierce eyes of Jupiter

Part Two

The day I lost my innocence

I was walking through the laced and golden fields of Lerna

And he appeared before me

Surging with desire

I thought to evade him

But his gaze made my limbs heavy

It surprised me how gentle his touch was

How quickly my body turned to butter beneath his mouth

And I forgot all reason for resistance

He stretched his arms wide

And summoned the clouds

Dark and pendulous

To cloak us from watching eyes

To hide our tryst from the world

From the crags of Mount Olympus

Hera, Queen of cunning

Sees the skies gather with thick grey matter above that golden meadow

Suspicion aroused

She descends her watch tower

Jupiter, clutching at me

In the height of his pleasure

Whispers furiously and casts me to the ground

‘mutatio bovum’

I fall to my hands and knees

The incantation still ringing in my ears

As a sharp pain splits my head

I arch my back

And I groan, deep and guttural from my throat

My breasts and belly convulse and sag

My fingers itch and I look down to see

My horror

Cloven hoofs upon the dusty ground

Hera chases the clouds

They scatter at her hand

The barley withers and blackens at her touch

Fruit smokes and falls from branches

A fatal ripening

Smearing the soil with flesh coloured pulp

‘What’s this?’

Her voice mordacious

But sweet as red wine

It cloys at my ears

And I feel dizzy from my transformation

‘what a beautiful bovine

A gift to be bestowed upon your faithful wife?

I have such a thirst for milk

Would you deny me, husband, what I desire?’

Part Three

When I was a beast

I walked the land without rest

One thousand eyes watch me

One thousand gadflies sting me

And all are sentry

With the patience of the ages

Jupiter for my womb

Hera for my life

Wandering drives me nearly to madness

But as I stagger through Bosporus

The earth shapes itself around me

To guide my passing

I come upon a man

Bound in invisible tethers to the side of Mount Caucasus

With an eagle feasting from his viscera

His face twisted in agony, he calls out to me

‘Mother of Dynasties

You shall come to rest in Egypt,

And there you will return to woman form

And the fruit of your womb

Will release my chains’

Part Four

I find myself in a land of new gods

And strangely shaped temples

And there my wanderings finally cease

As I fall beside the Nile

Horns and hoofs retreating

My woman form returns

The day I became a Mother

I lay mired on that riverbank

Mud swells around my hips

And streaks across my distended belly

Milk leaks from my heavy breasts

And courses down my brindled body

The Nile rages

And I cry out in agony

for the child charging from my womb

the fluid of my fertility runs thick and fast around me

and courses through the mud

Unto me a babe is born

Precious child mud, river and earth

I clutch at him with all my remaining strength

And he feverishly drinks my life’s milk

The tide rises

And the sun bakes the mud to our skin

I name him Epaphus

For my skin still trembles from the touch of his conception

Part Five

When I was an old woman

They named me Isis

Mother of Dynasties

Each day my son grows stronger

They say he will rule Egypt

A great horned King

And son of his sons

Will free those who are eternally bound

But I have withered

My womb still aches

My skin is stained

Daubed and couple coloured

I lose my words

And moan from my throat

My legs buckle beneath me

And my hands grip the earth

Sometimes in my dreams I walk those halls

I see the ground crack beneath Jupiter’s holy feet

I still see that golden field

Blistering and smoking

I feel the grain pressed hard against my skin

I smell those cloying fruits

And feel his touch curdle me like butter

But I am a wise and weary woman

The child I once was burns in the sky

Beside her first love and his wild, fierce eyes

And my great, great granddaughters

Will return to that city Argos

And will walk the fields of Lerna freely