Aphrodite probably had female lovers. A lot of Greek gods had those
bisexual tendencies. Who didn’t back then? Apollo had his fair share,
and cypress trees still weep over fallen stags in long-forgotten forests. It isn’t
dumb to assume the gods held more secrets than they left behind;
everyone has stories they won’t tell, even if the ones they do share
follow eyebrow-raising and cheek-reddening exploits. Exploring
gender-based transformations gives way to understanding close-
held identities. Women turned into men to live lives they were happier with
imbed in my memory years after they would’ve been of use. Leucippus was
just a name I fumbled over before, now turned into a man that mirrors myself.
Kalais and Orpheus do their own dance, sing their songs of adventure and
love and separate when their job is complete. Was it true love? It
must have been, since I can’t find any other reason to let oneself
nod off, thinking of him, in a dangerous countryside alone,
only to end up dead and waiting in Elysium forever—after all,
perfect beings like gods could never die. Was there ever happiness for
queer people in mythology? Maybe Apollo found it while he
reminisced on dates with Hyacinth, wondering if a god’s hand could get
sweaty before he reached out to hold the hand of his beloved. They can’t be
together long, of course. None of them can. Hyacinth is lost to jealousy
under the guise of a gust of wind from a scorned suitor. ‘Traditional
values’ don’t make sense to me when the traditions I read went against
what they spoke about in kindergarten at church. I consumed
X-rated myths like they were my Greek version of Grimm’s fairytales. I’ve
yet to lose faith in these stories, though, the ones I’ve found myself in; ones where
zinnias may have once been the ancient lesbian lovers of Aphrodite.
bisexual tendencies. Who didn’t back then? Apollo had his fair share,
and cypress trees still weep over fallen stags in long-forgotten forests. It isn’t
dumb to assume the gods held more secrets than they left behind;
everyone has stories they won’t tell, even if the ones they do share
follow eyebrow-raising and cheek-reddening exploits. Exploring
gender-based transformations gives way to understanding close-
held identities. Women turned into men to live lives they were happier with
imbed in my memory years after they would’ve been of use. Leucippus was
just a name I fumbled over before, now turned into a man that mirrors myself.
Kalais and Orpheus do their own dance, sing their songs of adventure and
love and separate when their job is complete. Was it true love? It
must have been, since I can’t find any other reason to let oneself
nod off, thinking of him, in a dangerous countryside alone,
only to end up dead and waiting in Elysium forever—after all,
perfect beings like gods could never die. Was there ever happiness for
queer people in mythology? Maybe Apollo found it while he
reminisced on dates with Hyacinth, wondering if a god’s hand could get
sweaty before he reached out to hold the hand of his beloved. They can’t be
together long, of course. None of them can. Hyacinth is lost to jealousy
under the guise of a gust of wind from a scorned suitor. ‘Traditional
values’ don’t make sense to me when the traditions I read went against
what they spoke about in kindergarten at church. I consumed
X-rated myths like they were my Greek version of Grimm’s fairytales. I’ve
yet to lose faith in these stories, though, the ones I’ve found myself in; ones where
zinnias may have once been the ancient lesbian lovers of Aphrodite.