Leda and the Swan

He came to me as the moon does, without warning
through fields of waning light. He was the swan
and I was his dove, water giving way beneath us
like wine.
He was a good lover, I’ll give him that.
Gentle despite his beak.
But I could only think of the wounded birds
I kept in jars as a child, how their feathers beat mercilessly
against the glass.
He was just another thing I had captured.
And when Helen went for his throat, I let her.
It snapped like all his promises.

Meggie Royer is a writer and photographer from the Midwest who is currently majoring in Psychology at Macalester College. Her poems have previously appeared in Words Dance Magazine, The Harpoon Review, Melancholy Hyperbole, and more. She has won national medals for her poetry and a writing portfolio in the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards, and was the Macalester Honorable Mention recipient of the 2015 Academy of American Poets Student Poetry Prize.