Helen of Nowhere
by Sophia Lang
The girl whose legs are sawn open lies with one foot hanging
over the side of the bed because
it hurts less. Queen of my country
mother of fire. Her womb is barren as the midday sun.
She has hips for
other reasons. She has hands
made for tearing. Made for
love. Bitten-down nails and
bruised knees. We all know the story. It is written
across her bare breasts. Mother of
ruin
born of the sky. She is not
of this world. She tastes
like nothing. Like absence. All she knows is
absence. Lies with one leg
hooked over her lover and the other trying to crawl
somewhere dark. mother of
cities. Burner of
girls. She is born years older
than she dies.
Atreids
by Sophia Lang
Upstairs,
the son is washing his hands in the bathroom sink until they
bleed
and staring in the mirror
at something once-human.
In the kitchen,
his three older sisters are learning how to hate. How to
slice fruit as though
it were flesh. How to slice flesh
as though it were not
your own.
The house shifts. Breathes. Their father and his brother,
sparring like gods. Like children. Brutalising the world
like
butchers. Like men. Shifts again.
Their wives,
raised on fairytales and meat-cleavers.
Raised to be wolves
to be sisters. Sharpening their teeth and
burning their men. Childless
mothers. Exhale.
A dish best served
bloody. Mother of fertility eating
the flesh of her land.
This house is no stranger
to things that move
in the dark.
Sophia Lang is a student from the UK with an obsessive passion for ancient Greek literature and mythology. Her next publication is forthcoming in Aothen Magazine, and she is an editor for The Afterpast Review.