Iphigenia’s Womb, poetry by Eric Robert Nolan at Spillwords.com
Jan Havickszoon Steen (The Sacrifice of Iphigenia)

Iphigenia’s Womb

Iphigenia’s Womb

written by: Eric Robert Nolan

@ericrnolan1

 

Once I knew a girl
Whose porcelain upturned face
Beseeched the passing sky.

I burned her.
I had to – every ship failed to sail
Against Troy – the Gods-confounded winds beached each.
I, Agamemnon, made my choice.
And it was predictable. We men
Burn our beauty before us.

Her fair hair fell aside
Of her inquiring upturned look.
“Father,” she implored – just that one word:
“Father.”

The flames first lapped her ankles.
The silk of her gown grew black.
Her white arms lit up in frenzy.
Her white legs darkened into charcoal.
Iphigenia’s womb became a furnace.
Her hair was made a conflagration.
Her wide eyes were then made burning mirrors –
Crimson-gold to reflect the fire.
Her rose cheeks crisped into orange.
Her mouth was a bright, lean kiln
Where desperate whispers were forged.
“I love you,” she told me.
Flames raced to her lips.

Eric Robert Nolan

Eric Robert Nolan

Eric Robert Nolan’s writing has been featured throughout 50 print and online publications in nine countries: the United States, Canada, Britain, Ireland, Germany, Romania, Turkey, India and Australia. These include Newsday (New York State’s third-largest newspaper and America’s 10th-largest), the Richmond Times-Dispatch (Virginia’s second-largest newspaper), The Roanoke Times (Virginia’s third-largest newspaper), The Free Lance-Star, The Daily Progress, The Galway Review, Every Day Fiction and Quail Bell Magazine. Eric’s writing and photography were also selected for ten anthologies, two chapbooks and six mini-books between 2013 and 2021. He is a past editor for The Bees Are Dead, and was a nominee for the Sundress Publications 2018 Best of the Net Anthology.Eric’s debut novel was The Dogs Don’t Bark in Brooklyn Any More, published in 2013 by Dagda Publishing in the United Kingdom.
Eric Robert Nolan

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