Monster
You spread dry monsters on the pale flowers:
Cracked tentacles, calcified fangs, horns
And hides and pelts of hounds of hell and
Artemisian golden hinds, lined up beside
Blinded cooling cyclops;
Viper-tressed gorgons beheaded
And bagged, Scylla's necks dragged out
Of her crags and splayed against sprays
Of heather and thyme, junebugs lapping
The sea-salt slime still damp on her teeth.
Herculean thief, even wildflower dusk
Won't mourn the husks you've laid out
Against sprays of heather and thyme.
This poem © Gabriel Gadfly. Published Dec 8, 2009
