Considering Caravaggio’s Portrait of Medusa by Sonia Greenfield

Medusa, by Caravaggio (b. Italy), 1597.

Considering Caravaggio’s Portrait of Medusa
 
That we have always
wanted to do away
 
with ugly, though who
gets to judge? She was
 
my mother after all
bullied by the gifted, her
 
face used as a weapon,
her story a cautionary tale.
 
A snake's skin is cool
to the touch, each scale
 
like a jewel, each jewel
onyx or topaz. I would
 
have liked to run my hands
over her hair and feel
 
its every sinew. In her
last breath we were born
 
from her torn neck.
It’s terrible to never know
 
your family. My twin
was born a winged horse
 
who took flight the minute
he sprung from the heart
 
in her throat. How he
carries this I'll never know.
 
Such burdens can drag
and turn us to stone.

Sonia Greenfield

Sonia Greenfield: "I was born and raised in Peekskill, New York, and now live with my husband and son in Los Angeles, California, where I teach writing at USC. My poems, essays, and fiction have appeared in a variety of places, including in 2010 Best American Poetry, The Antioch Review, The Bellevue Literary Review, Cimarron Review, Cream City Review, The Massachusetts Review, Meridian, and Rattle. My first book, Boy with a Halo at the Farmer's Market, won the 2014 Codhill Poetry Prize."