Persephone in January: A Chant Royal by LindaAnn LoSchiavo

I

It's basic January's thirty-one.

The winter air grows bald without that touch

Of holy, bold-brimmed harvests overrun.

Gold apples underground have gone. So much

Once sweet has turned acidic, black, or bare.

Honed branches aim for birds quick in pale air

That seems fresh seeded with defeats possessed,

A storm of chords now rocking trees undressed.

Surprised by sudden chill, forget-me-nots

Desert those once loved, a Ceres now distressed

By death's familiar turnings of a plot.

II

In January, Dis thinks he has won.

Infernal Hades's harvesters so much

Exceeded expectations seers spun

For pomegranates underground. As such

Diversions of desire share his stare,

His throne-mate, pale Persephone compares

This red fruit, scrotal plump, intent unblessed,

With orchards fruited up above, suppressed

Because her mother wept, planned not, forgot

Old love untutored by a loss, depressed

By death's familiar turnings of a plot.

III

Past January, fasting lasts, begun

The day Dis kidnapped Ceres's daughter, clutched

Persephone, unwilling, from her sun,

Her mother's surplus grace, her world re-touched

With shades of gray. No place to love in there.

It's carne vale, farewell to flesh, she swears,

Intending slow starvation's comfortless

Protection. Thin as a shade, she fades, digests

Nothing that's Hades-grown...except this blot:

Six pomegranate seeds bled "no" to "yes"

By death's familiar turnings of a plot.

IV

It's January still though June is done.

Spring's miracles have slipped. Earth needs her crutch:

The structured touch of Ceres spinning sun's

Contentment into healing greens. With much

On his agenda, Zeus thinks she's unfair

To gods and men, sad Ceres. He declares

Some compromise is due now nonetheless.

"Return Persephone!" he orders Dis.

But pomegranate pips sweet six allot

To a husband—a mother, too. Three win much less

By death's familiar turnings of a plot.

V

The earth grows things unlike itself, outdone

By Ceres, making matches, shades touched up

On flowers partnered with her hopes full sunned,

Unlooked for love on their home soil, dew-kissed luck.

Persephone plies arteries aware

Of sub-plots titled root and stem, her heirs,

That legacy of marrying success

Between what's light and dark, spliced East and West.

Each phoenix can embrace forget-me-nots'

Returning blaze. Joy's whys are repossessed

By death's familiar turnings of a plot.

ENVOY

Love fortified can multiply redressed.

Belligerent with light, a Persephone

Remembers darkness, too, deserves a shot.

New things to love arrive although accessed

By death's familiar turnings of a plot.