Andromeda

She was the first pin-up.
Naked and bejewelled,
she was chained to a rock,
then thrown by heavy-breathing
winds into wild postures:
at each new angle, lightning
popped like a photographer's flash.
The gold circling her neck
matched her hair, the emeralds
her eyes, the rubies her nipples,
and the amethysts those bruises
covering her skin, once pearl-
white as for all princesses.
In lulls of wind, she pulled
against iron, stood almost straight.
The sky was a mouth swallowing her,
the sun a glimmering eye;
lolling in the tide, a sea-dragon
slithered and gurgled like
some vast collective slob.
From afar, Perseus saw her first
as a creature writhing on a rock;
close up, she was a whirlpool
or rage and terror and shame.
The dragon he changed to stone
with hardly a thought. But
his strength almost failed him
in unlocking those chains.
Looking away from her nakedness,
he smooths her ankles, wrists.
She waits for the moment
when he will meet her eyes.