There is no mention of her
in the songs of Dionysus
or Aphrodite's strophes.

She was the daughter of Atlas
the Titan who carried the weight
of the world on his shoulders.

She was the youngest
of the seven sisters
the faintest star of the Pleiades.

And while her sisters cavorted,
fooled around and bedded down
the lords of Olympus,

she married a mere mortal
Sisyphus, the once and future king
of fruitless labor.

She has been forgotten
relegated to almost anonymity
with no immortality.

            Merope

is now only a six-letter answer
to a cryptic crosswords puzzle
or the question of a poem.