A goddess is taken to the underworld as the king's bride; her father knew everything and her mother knew nothing. In this retelling of the Hymn of Demeter, mother and daughter will do whatever it takes to free themselves, no matter the cost.
Book I...
The rustic oracle delivered a bad omen. Two breaths to blow it all. Her love was troubled. The six aigrettes left were a reminder of her lie, the numbers of seeds eaten—the pending curse above her head.
Persephone flung the dandelion aside and grieved in disappointment as she floated on the grass while laying on a long, floral swing suspended from trees.
It was another beautiful day in the garden of delights, where fruits grew in plenty and flowers bloomed to live for eternity, but Persephone would swallow up death forever. No one would wipe away the tears on her face; she would bear the pain in heaven.
Her constant sobbing was the ghost cries that Demeter kept on hearing around her daughter since the day they were back at Mount Olympus.
Embarrassment, self-punishment, inertia—the Goddess of Harvest survived them all, but not how to make her daughter talk to her again. Six days of being a powerless witness to an unknown torment, Persephone hadn't said a single word to her, but somehow she had said enough. Demeter then remembered how her daughter used to cheer her up—it was just her tiny head popping out from a bush to make her fake a fright, but they laughed for hours about it.
Demeter smiled at this idea and hid behind a bush to spring out from its leaves. A crying Persephone fell off of her flowery swing, and instead of laughing, she brandished a small dagger hidden from under her dress. She was on her guard, ready to kill her potential assailant, but she had it pointed at her mother instead.
Persephone tucked it away, but the sharp weapon had already injured Demeter. She had never taught such things to her daughter, yet only someone who had to survive had to know such defence mechanisms.
Staring down at her daughter's shaking hands, Demeter's voice broke as she said, "It's just me, your mother!"
Persephone froze on the spot, still dreading the recent murder she had witnessed. No words came out of her mouth, but she did tilt her head away, allowing Demeter to reach near enough to grasp her hands.
"Persephone?" Askalaphos said, revealing its presence by the side of his mistress.
Demeter's eyes protruded at the intruder, and her tone became stern when she said, "Please tell that awful bird to leave."
With violence, Persephone disengaged herself from her mother. "If it goes, I'll go too," she answered with the same resentment and a finger pointed at herself.
Demeter pursed her lips and shook her head with doubts; she no longer knew who that person in front of her was. She drew closer to Persephone again, her hands cupping her face. "It can stay then; you only needed to ask me, your mother."
Persephone grabbed Demeter's hands before tossing them aside. "Why did it take you so long to find me?"
"Persephone, no one knew where you were!" she answered to her daughter's marble face. She noticed those strong, interlocking calcite crystals in her complexion and felt helpless towards them. Persephone's frozen expression wouldn't crack under the pressure of her tenderness, and it wouldn't either recrystallise under the warmth of her motherly love. Not even her tears could change it. With a trembling chin, Demeter added, "Please, this is me, your mother, and I would never leave you again. They planned your abduction..."
Before she could finish her sentence, Persephone's clenched fists dropped to the ground, and blood streaks injected into her eyes when she shouted, "Who are they?"
Demeter racked her throat in hesitation, but Persephone wouldn't give her a chance. "Tell me the truth about my birth." The dandelion turned lion when she stepped closer, close enough for Demeter to gulp down in fear. "Tell me who my father is and what he did to you." Before pouncing her prey's back against a tree trunk, she snarled through clenched teeth, "Tell me where our island is. Tell me everything, because here I am as your daughter, trapped in your heart with more questions than love back for you!"
The disarmed Demeter felt paralysed under her daughter's claws, but a lioness only initiated the kill.
"What did they do to you in the Underworld?" Demeter's chin hung in defeat to her chest while her arms clung to herself in comfort.
"You can't even answer one question from me, so why should I say anything to you?" Persephone shook her head and was about to leave when her mother pulled one of her arms back. She turned around and threw a last gaze at Demeter. "You'd think that I don't know?" Persephone paused. "You killed so many innocent mortals, mother, and for what?"
Demeter's eyes suddenly raised up, and she stared at her daughter with a tight jaw. "I will kill anyone to keep you safe Persephone and I will do it all over again if I have to!"
Tears suddenly burst out of Persephone as she ran away. Her head spun around; the voice of her mother haunting and hurting her. She wanted to tell her the whole truth. While many words wanted to come out from her mouth, the worst sentence screamed its way out instead: "I don't want to remember."
From afar, Demeter heard her child. Clinging to a tree, she whispered, "Please tell it to yourself once; then you will never have to remember anything again."
Demeter was left only with doubts and griefs. She abandoned herself there, collapsing to the ground with her daughter now being a mere stranger to her.
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
______ DID YOU KNOW? ______
ISAIAH 25:1–12 He will swallow up death forever; and the Lord God will wipe away tears from all faces, and the reproach of his people he will take away from all the earth, for the LORD has spoken.
PLATO (in the PHAEDO) "Must not all things at last be swallowed up in death?"
At the beginning of this chapter, you might notice my use of this famous sentence "Persephone would swallow up death forever." Indeed, the defeat of death had been accomplished in Hell is an Empty Heart; Demeter no longer killed all the mortal lives to find her daughter, but does that go without consequences?
