Format by destabilise.
Are gods really gods
if no one believes in them anymore?
Zeus takes walks in the rain and tries to talk up joggers in
central park. When they bolt, or only return his advances with
polite smiles that look like fence posts too high for even him
to jump, he sighs. He tells them he is a god, and his words
echo back to him, accompanied by laughter. No one believes him
He picks up his wife, who might be his sister in this time, in
a beat up car with a beautiful flame job, Hera is a marriage
counselor with peacock feather bags under her eyes, her advice
falls on her own deaf ears as her jealous eyes roam over every
girl they pass, and she is right to. She knows this. She has
always known.
Poseidon’s hands are rough and calloused, he raises cargo
too heavy for a man his age, the young ones say. He laughs his
fisherman’s laugh, all depths and riptide, because no one
should be his age. He reminds himself he is one of the lucky
ones, he gets to be around what he loves. He may not have his
dominion any more, but salt water and sun still weather his
face.
Hades stalks the streets at night, women cross the street to
avoid him, and he smiles with his needle-teeth, they are right
to. This winter he is without a bride, and he still wants to
usher souls into the afterlife, the pistol hangs heavy in his
pocket, his tongue glints gold, the coin to pay his Charon, his
most loyal employee. He brings knives to gunfights and guns to
fistfights, he stands with his arms out like their new God,
these fickle humans, he welcomes the bullets. He dares them to
kill him. They try.
Ares and Athena spit curses laced with whiskey from across dive
bar floors, they are moving human pawns across a chessboard.
They were strategists before they were gangsters, but it
doesn’t matter now.
Apollo sings in a nightclub, his crooning voice from a
forgotten time. He has his sister’s blood under his
fingernails, from stitching up wound after wound, Artemis
forgets she is not invincible anymore. He sings about the moon
and wonders where she is, picking a fight with some would-be
rapist, maybe it’s Zeus. It’s probably Zeus.
Again.
Dionysus drinks away their shared pain, dealing LSD in dark
alleyways, he whispers sweet promises and his followers believe
him, he was human once and he can be again, like wine, he knew
nothing so sweet could have lasted forever. Icarus sidles up to
his side, asking if he’s got anything that can make you
feel like you can fly. In this life, he is a junkie, and
Daedalus watches with ancient, sad eyes. Icarus is melting and
Dionysus is letting him.
Hestia sits by the hearth and waits for her family to come
home. And she listens while they all curse their immortality.
She shakes her head slow and clicks her tongue, I know, my
darlings, I know.
Are gods really gods if no one believes in them anymore? Does
it matter?
"Are the gods really gods?"
Marissa dakin, 2015