Persephone Confesses

Yes, Mother.

Fine, I’ll come up now.

Time to breed lilacs out of the dead earth

for the hyacinth girls,

Feed desire with memory.

Sometimes I turn and run

Back into his arms

Before I suffer my ascent

To the land of the living.

Oh, see how they flock to me,

These suitors my mother desires,

dreaming of little

gods and goddesses

to shower with her love

Of this wretched earth.

As if the flowers weren’t enough.

As if my hours in the sun with her

Are not enough.

As if nothing

will ever

be enough.

She says he stole me. You can

ask Zeus; she made such a public display

of her suffering, pining for me on Mount Olympus,

drowning the mortals below

with her selfish tears

Until Zeus sent Hermes

to fetch me home.

Oh, Hermes, are you friend or foe?

Have you kept my secret

all these years? The truth was mine;

Your embellishment

made it a lie, my lie

To spare my poor mother’s sobbing,

bleeding, lonely heart.

Pomegranate, do they still say?

They know nothing of the night,

Of love’s tide washing the world away.

The depth of souls, the darkness within.

It’s light that brings shadows,

Summer heat makes me long

for cold winter nights, wrapped in

his embrace. I live for the moments

I’m away from this world,

Lost in his eyes, trembling at his touch,

The honeyed lilt of his voice

caressing my ears, soothing

the ravenous beast inside me,

these torturous eruptions

of flowers, ripping my soul

from my body, opening

me to the world. It’s no accident

that lilies smell like death.

There I was, exhausted from the

blossoming, the cool earth

heaven on my skin,

in the shade of a laurel tree.

I dug my hands down into the dirt

Until his fingers found mine,

Blindly exploring my wrists and palms,

Lightly tracing the lines of my arms,

Cradling my shoulders

in the palms of his hands.

I felt alive for the first time,

Him touching me, not troubling

my petals,

Touching me . . . just to touch me,

A silken caress softer than a raindrop,

whispering yes.

Oh, the pleasure of sinking down

Into the earth, letting go

of the need for water,

beneath the tangled roots,

Loose and free, unseen.

I melted into him, his mouth finding mine,

his beautiful hands on my face.

Everything changed

the moment I became his.

I savor the memory of every millimeter

of his skin on mine, every second

of the time we stole, each time

I was nourished

by his delectable seed.