PHORKYAS [to Helen]
To threaten the domestic still remains a right
That fits the noble consort of the heaven-blest king, Well-earned by years of that high lady's governance.
Since, Madam, you, now recognized, assume again
Your former privilege of chatelaine and queen,
Then take in hand the reins long lying slack, to rule
And have the treasures in possession, us with them.
But most of all protect me, shield my reverend years,
From this young brood, who by the swan your beauty is
Seem naught to me but coarsely feathered cackling geese.

LEADER OF THE CHORUS
How ugly, seen near beauty's pride, is ugliness.

PHORKYAS
How foolish, seen at wisdom's side, is foolishness.

- Goethe, Faust, Part Two


Mephistophilia

Fresh from the eight million four hundred eleven thousand and fifteenth Walpurgisnacht, I lucidly recall how a sister of the Graiae lunged at me. Another one of them! Pathetic, really. It's like there's no getting used to this.

Her jump. My sidestep.

It took me less half a beat to realize that, like the others before, this one carried with her neither tooth nor eye. She fell not upon me - for my feet are of mercury - but upon my solemn charge, the good doctor.

Poor, brilliant Faust. Faust the peerless! Lulled by homunculi and phantasmagoria, he bumps on his Helen (and Helen, on him, bumping and humping). With the haste of his craft, he flees with her. Sightless and eager to rid of my shadow, who can fault him? Unaware and triumphal, he carried off a mere daughter of Phorkyas wearing a mask, the charms of Helen!

The blind hauling the blind.

A long yesterday ago, when I was above, before the Wager, long before the Fall, the Pater infused me with fluids of silver and gold. Now, they pump as bile, slime yellow and tar black. Fantastic how they can still rise.

So, shall I fly? Or wait until I am not even a memory? Maybe never. Or until distance tells that I opted for 'never'.

The story is now - more than ever - my prerogative.