by Michael Estabrook
Asterion minotaurus
I’m the victim do you hear me!
I’m the fucking victim here!
My mother, Pasiphaë, satisfying her unquenchable lust
(damn Aphrodite) by copulating with a bull — a damn BULL!
Who does that, seriously WHO!
My mother the great WHORE that’s who
and what am I supposed to do with that image
where am I supposed to put it?
how do I deal with it psychologically? Well HOW?
So of course I’m born a hideous monster
a slavering, insane ferocious half-man half-beast
with horns and all, scared the bejesus outta everybody
I can tell you that, was kinda funny, the look on their faces.
So King Minos my sensitive and selfless stepdad
brings in Daedalus the Crafty
who constructs a vast maze
beneath Knossos Palace as my prison
to ensure that my life remained forever a living hell.
Well of course I ate people
it was an age of human sacrifice for crying out loud!
I loved those succulent virgins
sacrificed to me every few years.
What else would you have me do stuck alone
in that damnable endless labyrinth
until Ariadne with her stupid ball of twine
lead the great hero Theseus ooohhh aaahhh
to the heart of the matter where he…
Yes and then there was Theseus
Theseus the Great, the King, the Conqueror, the Coward!
The perfidious little prick snuck up on me in the dark
speared me in the face. The Bastard!
How was I supposed to know he was there?
no one was ever there NO ONE! EVER! BUT! HA!
I get the final laugh because I live on, yes I do
I live on immortal as the beast within you, within every man
and shall so remain until the end of days.
Michael Estabrook has been publishing his poetry in the small press since the 1980s. He has published over 20 collections, a recent one being The Poet’s Curse, A Miscellany(The Poetry Box, 2019).
