We sing so they will come

They come, only to drown, their bleached bones make a hollow thunk against the oily black outcropping where we make our home

And their fellows sail home to whisper their stories, painting us as wretched and malicious, seductive murderesses of men

We watch as they pass in their vessels

Passing us, hurriedly, rushed, dreading our lonely voices

Or else hurl tangles of seaweed and rocks to shut our mouths for us

Ramshackle fishing ships

Black frigates of war, pregnant with soldiers or spoils from Troy

Sun-ripe youths with broad shoulders

Muscle-bound men with all the brass and crimson of military pomp

We sing our nonsense lyrics

Hoping to entice

Straining our voices that they may hear the pleas for rescue with which we lace the sickly-sweet melody

The pelicans and gulls bring word of the men approaching our slick rocky prison

Their tales of heroism and romantics are as love serums among us

They tell me of Odysseus, the great wit and tactician, bane of the Trojans and of the terrible Cyclopes, son of Laërtes and king of mountainous Ithaca

I pull the knots from my unkempt, salty hair and braid strands of chlorophyta algae into it

"Call my name, Odysseus! Loose your bonds and paddle, hand over hand, across the breaking crystal waves, to clasp me in your wide arms, O hero of the Greeks!"

But a man bound to his ship's pine mast, no matter how eminent his name, is of little help to a whimpering girl stranded on an ebony platform surrounded by the boundless miles of shimmering Tyrrhenian confines

And nor is a crew of wax-deafened oarsmen

We wail for rescue till our voices are hoarse, till the salt on our cheeks, from ocean spray and from tears, burns into old cuts and bruises

And as his billowing white sails swim off across the line of the horizon

We swallow our cries like thick loaves

We dry our sisters' eyes

We set free our dearest doves of hope, heretofore held too close to our virgin breasts

We set free our yearnings to assume the benign title of mother and wife, to expunge the noxious title of Siren