Demeter laments
©Cameron Altaras
From what heights and beauty did you descend
To claim your space in my womb,
Oh, Persephone?
The maternal longing for you
The years of yearning for you
The pleading to all the powers of the Universe
For you,
Oh, Persephone.
The flood of love on which you rode
Spun me beyond the limits of my mother-knowledge orbit
Stirred a latent tenderness in my secret hidden coves
Streamed me with cherished yet unspoken understandings and
Warming you against my breast
Nurturing your preciousness
The hours I spent singing to you,
Oh, my dear Persephone.
Why did Zeus permit the hallowed earth to groan to crack to swallow up your cry
To beg me come and save you,
Oh, Persephone?
The fight for you
Risking my very role for you
The courtroom of the gods loomed ominous
and I was warned,
Oh, Persephone,
“They have the power to forever take away your daughter.”
Imploring from deep within my ancient soul
Unswerving focus on my womb’s most-ever-precious
Gambling everything, my heart and even more
To win back my right to dry your tears and tuck you into bed
The days I spent pleading my case and arguing for my motherhood,
Oh, my dear Persephone!
Why did I have to turn my life inside out to save you from
The mean-spirited, oh so manipulative sins of the fathers,
Oh, Persephone?
Narcissisms’ genes had stained you
Blithe and vulgar promises had lured you
Hades unfettered, transferred generations of self-destruction through your
Shuddering and squandered the light of your soul,
Oh, Persephone,
Seizing you with charismatic odes to your potential
Dismissing all the ruthless chaos he unleashed when
Setting you upon a throne, isolating you from life on this side
The days and sleepless nights I barely made it through for you,
Oh, my dear Persephone.
Who would believe what my journey
Through my own Hell entailed to extricate you from
The trappings of entitlement I’d taught you to avoid,
Oh, Persephone?
The crown already set upon your head
Hades’ hollow fantasies inscribed on pomegranate jewels
Slipping one by one, now five, now six between your parted lips and
Gliding down your throat right before my eyes,
Oh, Persephone,
I saw you cleave to this, his smallest kindness
Your transgression firmly bonding you to him
Compels me now to quash my mother-loving instincts and concede for
The six months out of every twelve that I must live without you,
Oh, my dear, my darling daughter,
Oh, my Persephone.
This poem is published in Cameron Altaras and Sharla Nafziger, Confronting the Patterns that Silence Us (Seattle, WA: G Scott Works, 2023), 70-71.