Seizing Medusa by Kori Bower (21, Ohio)

My hair is pulling out of my scalp, heavy 
like the cords attached to my head --
 
sticky, itchy, painful to take off. They are 
venomous snakes and I am Medusa. 
 
Memories, sucked out of me with the force 
of her former beauty, with the cursed ease 

---

that she can take or give life, and the power
that tore through her innocence melding us
 
with the loss of mine. We shatter into pieces,
leaving only the ghosts of our torments floating
 
in front of our eyes. The hollow stone shell 
of my brain is what cleaves our heads open; 
 
static VCR tones are our screams. The rocking 
horse I haven't owned for at least ten years 
 
is Perseus's steed lurching forward; it slams 
into us with the cold, stony indifference 
 
of a battering ram. Fresh stone or damp wood, 
the coolness is indistinguishable against our
 
skin. Wallpaper chips off the ceiling, sprays 
disintegrating baby deer eyes like pellets of acid
 
rain; but it isn't rain, it's blood; the blood of Medusa, 
dripping onto my forehead from her right temple
 
as she leans over me, exorcized, and my eyes
are my own again when I open them now. 
 
The shower water feels like tiny bullets against 
my skin as I get up off the floor, legs unsteady 
 
as a fawn, and though I feel her presence fade, 
the swirling portal inside me closing for now, 
 
we do not say goodbye.