Pygmalion and the Statue

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“EXCUSE ME MISS,” Pygmalion said shyly. “Could you… Would you mind… I mean…”

“Aren’t you a cutie, all tongue-tied?” The young woman answered. “What is it you want, handsome? Just say it. Anything you want.”

“I was wondering if you would stand just a little more to the left so the light hits you better.”

“Stand? You mean here? Like this?” She moved slightly and he nodded.

“Lift your head just a little.” She did. Pygmalion quickly bent to his tablet and began scratching on it with charcoal. She was so beautiful. He worked quickly but carefully.

Seeing what he was doing, the young woman smiled. She canted her hips a little and thrust out her bosom. Then she took deep rhythmic breaths, lifting her breasts with each inhale and letting them fall as she exhaled. Pygmalion looked up at her and noticed her loose tunic gapped open slightly and from this angle he could see just a hint of color crowning the proud mound of her breast. He tore his eyes away from the sight and continued to draw. So smooth. So perfect. So inviting. In his drawing, he let the tunic fall open enough to see the aroused nipple as if showing through the thin fabric. Her bearing was regal. Her throat was long and exposed from her chin to the cleft between her breasts—thin and elegant. Her hair was caught back in ringlets, each tied to the one before it. Her arms were bare, the flawless skin exposed to the shoulder. Below her thin waist, her hips flared. He trailed his eyes downward where she had subtly gathered her skirt in her hand to show her shapely leg. His eye involuntarily rose to her breast again. He was sure it was more fully exposed than it had been just a moment before. He glanced nervously around the agora, but no one seemed to notice him or the young woman brazenly showing herself to him on the temple steps. He used his thumb to blend the tones of her flesh as the perfectly shaped breast met her ribcage. He could almost feel her skin beneath his fingers. So sensuous.

“Are you finished yet?” Pygmalion realized he had stopped drawing, his thumb still caressing her nipple, barely touching the charcoal on the tablet.

“Yes. Thank you very much. Very much.”

“That will be a silver penny.”

“What?”

“For standing here in the heat posing while you drew. You need to tip me.”

“Oh. Yes. Of course.” Pygmalion fumbled in his purse, moving aside several pieces of charcoal in order to reach the coin. “Are you a professional?”

“Not full time. I have other duties, but men pay better.”

“Well, thank you.”

“Wait. What’s your rush? Let me see the drawing.”

“Um, okay.” He held the tablet toward her, but she pushed him gently to the step and sat on his lap before pulling his hand around her to look at the drawing.

“Hmm. Not very good, are you?”

“What? It’s a quick sketch. And besides, charcoal isn’t truly my medium. Marble is. I just need reference material.”

“Oh? You intend to carve my boob in stone? You seem to really like it.”

“What?”

“Well, look how well-developed my boob is compared to my face. Just the hint of an eyebrow and a line for the lips. But the texture and shading of my boob is exquisite. Look.” She held her tunic open just far enough that he could easily see down her front and her entire left breast. “See? It’s so real and lifelike that you could almost reach out and touch it.” He no longer knew if she was referring to the picture or to herself. His heart was beating more rapidly as he felt his manhood become turgid beneath her. “Would you like to?”

“Like to?”

“Like to reach out and touch it? Caress my skin. Feel how hard my nipple becomes beneath your hand?” She squirmed in his lap a little, bringing his penis to a full erection. “You must have a lot of stress in your job—trying to make sure it’s all perfect, not daring to chip away the wrong thing. I could help you… uh, unblock your muse. Get your… creative juices flowing, so to speak. We could go just inside and find a private space where you could explore my various aspects to your heart’s content. I’ll teach you what a real woman feels like. You can even draw me again if you must. Let the function of clothing truly follow my form.”

“I don’t… where?”

“Just in the temple there.”

“In the temple? What are you?”

“I’m a priestess. But what can I say? What does any man want from the goddess but to get laid? I’m in the business of answering prayers. For a modest fee, of course. Two silver for the room and a gold for me. Come and let me make you come.” She reached between them to stroke his cock.

“I… but… that’s prostitution! You are a priestess of the goddess.”

“So, you think I should give it up for free? The goddess is a myth. I am real and I’m available.”

“No! No. I am sorry.” Pygmalion tried twice to stand before dislodging the prostitute priestess. She stood and straightened her robes.

“Sure? I promise I’ll make it worth your time. That sudden release of inspiration would do you good,” she said, reaching for him again.

“That’s… it’s an abomination! How could you sell your body in the name of the goddess?”

“All the priestesses do it. It’s how the temple stays open, how we pay for our shelter and food.”

He looked into her kohl-rimmed eyes, seeing past her friendliness and nearly retching at what he saw. So cleverly concealed behind a pleasing body and face, she was hard, mercenary, her intent on his purse rather than on him. There was no goddess here. No love. Nothing but a business transaction. He looked again at his drawing and then threw it at her feet as he ran from the public plaza.

Pygmalion was sick. Throwing-up-in-the-alley-like-an-all-night-drunk sick. And he’d had no wine. The day had started well. He took his tablet to the market square in front of the temple to look at people and draw. A concept had vaguely begun to take shape in his mind for a wonderful new sculpture for the prince’s vestibule in praise of Aphrodite, but he needed to look at people more closely—how they stood when they spoke to each other, how they stood or sat when they thought no one was watching. Then she appeared on the temple steps and it was magnificent. He wanted to capture the sun shining through the fabric of her skirts, showing the shape of her legs. How could he capture that in marble?

But she was a prostitute. That in itself didn’t bother him. Many women were prostitutes and, though some were worn and weary, many were happy enough. It was better than starving, one older woman told him.

But she was a priestess of Aphrodite! The Propoetides were sacred to Aphrodite. No man would dare touch them inappropriately. And worse, she had called blessed Aphrodite a myth—set herself up to be able to answer prayers. Offered her body as a substitute for faith.

Pygmalion threw up again.

I will never look upon a woman again! They are a disgrace to the goddess.

“So you will tar all women with the disgrace of the Propoetides?” a voice said nearby.

What? Did I say that aloud?

Pygmalion looked around and saw an old man sitting on a step at the end of the alley. Both hands were on the knob of a crooked cane and his white beard nearly touched his lap. Yet his piercing blue eyes were clear and Pygmalion felt nailed to the spot beneath their gaze.

“I beg your pardon, sir? Did you speak to me?”

“Yes. You say women are a disgrace to the goddess. Are you ready to paint them all the same? Or should I say, ‘ Cut them from the same block of marble’?”

“How could one trust a woman once the Propoetides have forsaken the goddess and turned to prostitution? They are her own! They walk with the goddess each day and yet they call her a myth.”

“Well, you don’t have to trust them to enjoy them. Personally, I thank the goddess for every young woman who deigns to smile upon me. Anything else she does is worthy of making an offering.”

“And so, you would defile a priestess, old man?”

“The priestess herself may be an answer to prayer. But you are an artist. What natural form is more perfect than the shape of a woman? When the white marble comes down from the mountains and you stand looking at those shapeless blocks, what do you first see? The very color and texture of the stone cry out, ‘ Here is a woman!’ When you touch her cold surface, you feel not the stone, but the perfect shape beneath it.”

“A woman carved of stone is pure and undefiled. A woman in the flesh is… I have no words. I must go home.”

“Feeling better now? Nothing to settle your stomach like the thought of cold hard marble.”

Pygmalion turned to snap at the old man, but no one was there.

The shape was perfect and Pygmalion switched from the gradina chisel to the scalpello. He worked steadily, the rhythm of his mallet on the chisel even and sure. This block was not large because Pygmalion did not want to waste material on his great experiment. He would be laughed at, surely, but it was a perfect form. Even the streak of blue that cut through the almost pristine cream-colored marble made a statement. Perfection was flawed. There was nothing perfect in the world.

For days, he worked in his studio, keeping the work hidden from prying eyes. The second piece of the sculpture had to be even more exactingly carved. It must match as a perfect inverse of the first. They had to fit together without a hair’s breadth between them. It would be dramatic then when the first piece began to float and then to spin.

“I must have the exact weight of the bala,” Demetrius complained. “And I need to know when I can work on the lekani to plumb it. Why did you make it so big?”

“Big? I thought it was small. No one will see it or understand unless they are standing right next to it. It is scarcely a sculpture to decorate the agora with,” Pygmalion argued.

“But for the entryway of the palati?”

“Yes. If our patron is pleased, it will reside in the center of the prothalamos. But who will see it there? It is not as if most people walk in the front door of the Prince’s home.”

“No. Only rich people who can afford to commission a sculpture from you.” They laughed and then set about the serious work of weighing and measuring the sculpture. Demetrius had devised a piston driven pump that would create the right amount of water pressure and began the task of plumbing the basin. Pygmalion stroked the sculpture with his hands searching for any imperfection in the surface.

Cold hard stone. How wrong the old man was. The stone was pliable beneath the touch of his chisel and rasp. He could feel the heartbeat within it and the warmth of its life.

“I am ready,” Agathos declared. “Let us see this new creation.”

Pygmalion stepped forward and released a cord that held the drape in front of his sculpture. There was silence as the small crowd looked first at the sculpture and then at their prince. The prince approached the ball sitting in a basin on a pedestal. He walked around it. He stood back and studied it. Finally, he spoke.

“Where are her boobs?”

There was shocked silence before the prince broke into laughter.

“Who was the model?” laughed his wife. “My shape is certainly nothing like that.”

“Not at all!” the prince declared, hefting his wife’s bosom before the people gathered.

“My Lord,” Pygmalion said. “If I may.” He felt the throb of the pump from beneath his feet and stretched a hand out to the sphere. They had tested it, of course, but that had been in the studio. If the pressure was too little, nothing would happen. Pygmalion touched the basin and felt moisture gathered around the edge. He touched the ball and gave it a gentle push. Had the ball been all white, no one would have noticed its movement. But the streak of blue that cut through the marble moved, rose and fell as the globe spun in its socket, lubricated by the water. There were noises of amazement and the prince fell back a step.

“Is this magic that the marble changes its stripe?” the prince asked.

“It may look magical,” Pygmalion answered, “but the ball is floating on water and is slowly rotating.”

“But how does if float? It is a stone. Stone’s sink.”

There was a brief argument and explanation and the prince was finally satisfied once he was taken to the cavern beneath the floor where Demetrius’ ingenious pump was working. At last, the prince, his wife, and his guests were satisfied and returned to the vestibule to stare at the slowly rotating ball of marble.

“You are a prince among sculptors, Pygmalion. You shall be richly rewarded… after I receive the sculptures that I want. I want beautiful women. A garden full of them. You got away with putting this… interesting form in my entry. Well, my guests will not expect that. But in my garden, I want women. Lovely, perfect, naked women. When you deliver them, you will have a kingdom of your own. Until then, nothing.”

“My Lord, Prince Agathos, I have foresworn women. I shall neither touch them nor carve them. I find women… disappointing.”

“Then you haven’t known the women I have known. But no matter what your preferences, I do not want a garden full of little boys.”

“No, my Lord. That is not what I mean.”

“It makes no difference to me. Little boys can be a comfort when a man is between women. But I will have a garden full of exquisite women carved in that ivory stone you like so much before you have a silver penny for your sculpture.”

Pygmalion wept.

He lay on his cot in the chamber next to his studio, head buried against his arms, and cried out to his goddess. It was not a cry of words but his heart rending in her presence. He had been so sure that the cleverness of his spherical sculpture would win the prince. The prince was pleased enough, but refused to pay unless Pygmalion forsook his vow and sculpted a woman. How could he do this?

“It might have been better if you’d floated a cube instead of a sphere.”

Pygmalion spun in his bed at the sound, sending tears flying. On the chair beside his bed sat a woman. No. So much more than a woman. A goddess. With that realization, Pygmalion rolled from his bed and prostrated himself on the floor.

“My Goddess,” he whispered.

“Rise, Pygmalion. You’ve pleased me.”

He looked up, startled. Pleased Aphrodite? When? How?

“Not like that!” the goddess laughed. “Yet. It pleases me that you see my priestesses for the whores they have become and that you have forsaken the company of women for my honor. You are true to me.”

“May I never forsake my vows to you, Precious Goddess.” He began to prostrate himself again, but a hand on his arm pulled him up. The goddess gently pushed him back to sit on his cot.

“Yes. I honor your devotion. But if your goddess asked you to do something, then that would not be against your vows since you have made your vow to your goddess, no?” Pygmalion tried to parse her words. His vow was to the goddess and therefore he would not be in violation of it if he were following her instructions.

“Can you possibly want me to fulfill the commission of the prince?” Pygmalion asked.

“I take vows quite seriously, Pygmalion. That is why I am upset over the same things that you are.”

“The Propoetides.”

“They vowed to serve me. Granted, I am a goddess of love and such service could include acts of love.”

“But it is not that they have sex with devotees,” Pygmalion rushed in. “I have been with a priestess,” he said, blushing. “But that was before. When I lay with her, I felt your presence and your blessing. Now… they don’t believe. They don’t even blush at their actions. I wish they were stone statues.”

Aphrodite stared at the sculptor, a smile slowly creeping across her lips. She forestalled his question.

“For now, we must get you working on Agathos’ commission.”

“But I cannot sculpt a woman.”

“Look at me, Pygmalion.” As he looked at her, the goddess stood and let her robes fall to the ground. Pygmalion’s mouth opened and his hands clasped over his lap so the goddess would not be offended by his manly response. His eyes fell first to her bosom and involuntarily trailed down to her sex before he tore them away to look at her eyes. “It is acceptable, Pygmalion. If I did not want you to look, I would not have commanded it. Look. Look at all of me.” As she spoke, she slowly turned so Pygmalion could see the proud thrust of her breasts in profile and then the fullness of her bottom, round and sensuous. He could see her cleft as she continued to turn toward him and could almost catch her scent. “Am I beautiful, Pygmalion?”

Pygmalion knew that his goddess, for all her good traits, was vain. It had been shown many times before. He would be a fool to say anything but yes, but even if it was not for the fear of her wrath, what he saw filled him with such intense desire that he could not have answered otherwise.

“The judgment of Paris stands, my Goddess,” he breathed. “Please let me bow and worship you.”

“Well, that didn’t work out so well. But Paris and Helen are centuries turned to dust. Let us see if we can do better by you.” She held out her hand to Pygmalion and he touched her for the first time. “Come to me, Pygmalion. The worship I crave cannot be done when you are bowed.” He stood before his goddess and realized that she was not quite as tall as he thought. She lifted her lips to him and he kissed her.

His heart stopped. He kissed the goddess Aphrodite—Astarte of old—the goddess of the spring ritual—the goddess of love, beauty, pleasure, and… procreation. He kissed her and surely now he must die. He was content.

“Are my lips soft, my artist? Do you feel the hardness of my nipples when I press against your chest? Do your hands find any flaw when they caress my skin, my back, my buttocks? Do not pass from me, my love. Touch me. Part the folds of my sex and feel the moisture. Place your lips on my nipple and suckle me like a newborn. Worship my body with your hands, your lips, your tongue, your cock. Enter me and know that I am your goddess and you are my love.”

Pygmalion’s heart restarted as his throbbing cock released his seed in the depths of the goddess and she moaned against his shoulder as they stood linked together.

“Now,” she whispered when their breathing slowed and they sat on his cot, still holding each other, “we must find a way to let you fulfill your commission without breaking your vow. You, my lover, my friend, my artist, will carve your statue—not of a woman, but of a goddess. I will model for you and you will release me from the stone.”

“Yes, my goddess,” he whispered. “I will do whatever you command.”

“That is what I love about you.”

“How many blocks of marble?” asked the astounded kyrios.

“His Highness’ command was ‘ a garden full of naked women.’ You know the palace better than I. Exactly how many naked women does a ‘ garden full’ comprise?” Pygmalion asked the chief of the prince’s staff as they walked between huge blocks of marble.

“Very well. Thirteen. Twelve for the garden and one to replace what you ruin.”

I will not ruin one.

“Humor him, my love.”

“Goddess?”

“Who are you talking to?” the kyrios demanded. Pygmalion looked around, but saw no one else near.

“He can neither hear nor see me,” a voice whispered in his ear. “I have reserved that for you.”

“I am honored.”

“Indeed, you are,” the major domo snorted. “He could have had Mathias sculpt his gallery. The cost would be much lower.”

“The cost would not be the only thing lower. Even his statues have warts.”

“So, he could just chisel them off. It’s only stone.”

“My dear Kyrios, I believe you have as low an opinion of art as I have of women.”

“Besides, Mathias only does busts,” the goddess laughed. “I think he was weaned too soon.” Pygmalion snorted and the chief of staff glared at him.

“Be that as it may, you can go and I’ll have the stone delivered to your studio.”

“Oh no. I shall choose each block. They must be perfect.”

“I chose the block for your vestibule sculpture and instead of following the prince’s instructions, you made a mechanical contraption.”

“Exactly. What would the prince think of the statue of a beautiful woman with a blue streak running across her breasts? I did the best thing possible with the travesty of material you supplied. This time I will choose my own stones and they will be the finest ivory white marble of Thassos.”

“You will make a white goddess that is flawless, my love,” whispered the goddess as she tugged his arm toward the blocks to be considered.

“Thassos! That is the most expensive…” the kyrios said to his back as the sculptor appeared to be dragged away. Shaking his head, the kyrios found the stone master and instructed him to bill thirteen blocks of marble that Pygmalion would choose to the prince’s domicile.

Pygmalion walked up to the first block in the row of new deliveries from Greece. He laid his hands on the stone and thought. He couldn’t see the figure within. The goddess laughed.

“Not that one; it’s dead,” the goddess said. “How about this one?” she asked approaching a block some fifteen feet tall. Pygmalion watched as the goddess shed her clothes and walked into the stone, turning in various poses, making the stone transparent for Pygmalion to see what would result. “Does this marble make my ass look big?” Aphrodite asked. It made everything look big, but Pygmalion was not about to say that.

“I believe we want something that is life-size,” he said cautiously. “This block is fit for a temple, but not for a simple prince’s peristyle.”

“There is no block here large enough for a life-size statue of me,” the goddess said smugly. “I suppose, though that we need human life-size and not goddess-size. Let’s try this one.” She stepped out of the mammoth block and into a block that was nearer the size that would be needed. She controlled her size and posed in the block.

“That’s very nice. I like that one,” Pygmalion said as he approached the stone. He placed his hand on the surface, but could feel the shape of the goddess beneath his fingertips. He caressed her softly.

“If you continue that, we will attract a crowd as you hump a block of marble,” she whispered. It was obvious to Pygmalion that he was not the only one aroused. He backed away from the block and took the goddess’ hand as she stepped down.

Pygmalion noticed that she did not bother to clothe herself again as she moved from one stone block to another, posing and primping in each. In each block, Pygmalion could see a different pose. There would be no row of near-identical Korai standing at attention here. Each stone would be a unique woman in her own pose. None of the poses the goddess struck were exactly lewd, but she kept no secrets hidden. At last they had chosen twelve blocks that pleased them both.

“They are all wonderful and what minor flaws there are in the stone I can remove as I carve, but I know none of these are the sculpture you want me to carve. We are running out of choices,” Pygmalion whispered so no one would overhear him talking to a goddess whose nude body was wrapped around him but invisible to all others.

“Yes. Those are for the prince and his cronies to gawk at and fantasize about. They will be real enough that even his wife will be jealous of the attention he pays them. But now we need the one stone that will be ours and ours alone. It will be the stone from which you render your lover.”

“My goddess, you know that my simple skill will never capture your true beauty nor the depth of passion I feel for you. When I touch the cold surface, I can feel your presence, but no other would ever recognize you in the depths of stone.”

“You will create the perfect woman, my artist. When you touch her, you will feel me respond.” They were deep in the stone market when they came upon a block covered with canvas. Pygmalion pulled the cloth from the stone gently, as if taking the clothes from his lover. Beneath was the purest white marble he had ever seen.

“It is like ivory, it is so pure,” he breathed. The cover had kept dust from collecting in the cutting grooves. Even these showed no impurities. It was the finest block of marble he had ever seen.

“No. No. You may not have that!” exclaimed a man rushing down the narrow aisle of stones. “That block must be…” He stuttered to a halt before them and knelt before them, much to Pygmalion’s confusion. “My goddess,” the man uttered. He can see her?

“You are not the only true believer, Pygmalion. Thanos, you have done well and shall be richly rewarded,” Aphrodite said to the stone merchant. Pygmalion noticed that she was clothed again and that assuaged his momentary jealousy. “Please deliver this stone and the others Pygmalion has marked to his studio. And charge the prince double what he would normally pay,” the goddess said.

“My goddess, for you I would charge nothing. Yet I will do as you command.”

“You have always been a faithful servant. I will speak with you soon about more stone and where it will be delivered. I want to improve the temple at my birthplace.”

“Thank you, Goddess. Pygmalion, I am honored to provide this ivory marble to you. Cut well.”

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