Medusa's Sisters

What freedom exists when men find you dangerous!

Medusa's mouth twisted. "I would rather be remembered for what I did, what I said, whom I loved, than how I met my end.

I have always known Fear. She was the fourth sister, and my most intimate acquaintance.

We do not apologize for the sins of men, Dora. Not today. Not ever.

Nobody requested our testimony. The voices of ugly women are easily diminished.

When I choose myself, do not be afraid if my choice looks different than yours

Euryale could barely conceal the odium in her voice. “And their mothers allow you to enslave their children or leave them for dead?” “The mothers must survive in a world where men and gods—and men who think they are gods—limit their choices.” Charmion’s nostrils flared. “To have choices is to have power. Most women have neither.

Danaë chose to survive. She chose to be brave, and perhaps she also chose revenge, for she named her son Perseus, the Destroyer. Do ewes call their lambs such?

Without their worship, without the women, you will wither away. And as your power wanes, I want you to know, I will be there, watching with rapture. Because I’m just the cast-aside sister, I don’t demand veneration to survive. I will witness it all.” “I am an Olympian,” he fumed. She shrugged. “For now.

Liquid sunrise poured into her soul, and she woke each morning full of hope.

My sisters compete. For favor, for suitors, for reputations. For our parents' love. We are connected only by secrets and lies.' Semele waved her kantharos at Euryale and Stheno, liquid sloshing once more onto the tiled floor. A harried girl hurried forward with a rag. 'You three accept other for all that you are and are not. You share your lives. That is sisterhood.

But that’s how stories are cultivated. Words and actions are sown, spreading repercussions like wildflowers: monsters begetting lovers begetting conflict begetting heroes. On and on endlessly.

To have choices is to have power. Most women have neither.

Riches, even freedom, matter very little if you cannot control your own womb.

She thought love a perfect pain. Come then. Break me, bend me. Hurt me flawless.

Find delight in your pain, she said, and rejoice in your longing. If it still hurts, you are alive, you are alive.

Our mortal sister is dead. She was Medusa. And we are the Gorgons.

Trauma that glitters is still trauma.

But how could losing what you never had compete with losing your everything?

I would not be separated from my sisters until they both left me first.

We will never be the same, Stheno. Accept us for what we have become.

Why didn't she take their tongues? She wanted to hear them scream.

Stheno became a murderer so Euryale didn't have to.

People can like bad art that brings comfort and entertainment; people can dislike good art that chafes.

The Sphinx’s tail curled as the storyteller’s gaze settled upon her eyes. It’s a look I’ve come to recognize, when a speaker inhabits the faraway and the present, retreating to memory, invoking language, and assembling both for an audience.

Why do men have nipples but no milk? Is wine a blessing or a curse? What is madness?

They behaved in ways that celebrated decadence and ambition, and the passions and feuds of their personal lives thrilled Euryale. Hungry for snippets of their hierarchical melodramas, she consumed the gossip and obsessed over their increasingly tangled relations.

She lifts her dress to wade, this river girl. She bares her ankles and shows her heart. —Erastus of Athens, “The Illness of Maidens

(And if not for this unruly captive, Hades might never have stumbled upon Persephone, gathering daffodils in a nearby meadow. But that’s how stories are cultivated. Words and actions are sown, spreading repercussions like wildflowers: monsters begetting lovers begetting conflict begetting heroes. On and on, endlessly.)