Secret Admirer

Every night at midnight, the purple clouds came out to dance with the blushing sky.

The blush turns orange and pink. It seeps into my very soul, where I feel I am sinking. Sinking and falling.

Like the cherry blossoms at midnight.

Spring isn’t here. Fall has begun.

I’m languishing beyond the mortal realm, and I long for sunshine, and the flower beds. I remembered when I had my freedom and that song that rang out during those hot midnight hours, when the dewy dawn hit and the deep purple would mist into light, sinking blue.

My eyes have grown accustomed to darkness. To the dreamy embrace of shadows and death, as I am the bringer of death—-I must be, for here I am drowning in death for most of my days. In my own personal hell I remain, no more light inside my budding domain, the haunting siren’s call of the devious mermaid’s cries sinking in my heart.

I remember playing with the sea nymphs and dancing in the flower beds. They used to give me scallop shells of many colors and hues for gifts.

I remember being free. That feeling escapes me like a stale taste of standing water, and my lifeless stomach settles into a restless cavern.

All good feelings, all of my emotions that delved between those dark purple star-scapes and glossy spring rolling hills, are all gone like a choked gasp.

When I plucked the yellow narcissis that my field of vision could not avoid, my energy drained—-

I collapsed into space, my porcelain skin ripped into with talon-like claws pulling me in with a ravenous hunger...and there I was swallowed into the swirling phantasm that was forthwith in the ground, like a portal. There, he parted with me, taking with him a piece of my heart and my mother’s soul.

I walked past Acheron, where the writhing souls whose pain I could feel being carried along the river called out to me. I wept. Though they were mere skeletons, almost indistinguishable between one another, I could hear their separate stories and their unique voices. I sensed history.

If they could be soothed, even from the river of The Lethe, to sleep in quiet and unawareness, they might have peace.

It was a stranger day than normal as I strolled near the Asphodel Meadows, to which I heard a crackling, splintering noise from up above me.

Suddenly, something dropping from above.

Was it from my mother?

I had heard she was scouring every inch of the planet to look for me, yet I am still here.

It fell by my feet.

It was a piece of paper.

I picked it up, and it read out a poem of sorts.

Persephone, dips into stunning dawn —

and dreams of no more shadows and death,

blooming the life of Spring in her breath,

taste of mourning in pomegranate, spinning together dizzily—She languishes,

yet as a Phoenix, one day Spring will be her only dream

I read it one hundred times over.

Who sent me this?

Certainly not my mother.

And what of the pomegranate? What did that mean? Of mourning... in pomegranate?

I reacquainted with Hades that twilight evening, yet I failed to tell him of this secretive poetry sent from above.

He crushed me with his eyes, and as I am childlike in manners of love, I felt pulverized by his manner. Noisy. Quiet.

Draining.

Searing.

Cold.

The new day arrived and I was alone.

Again, I was by the meadows, and I heard it. A crackling. A ripping. Of seams and earth, of plains of existence and scales of space and time.

Another piece of paper.

I was beginning to suspect it was a mortal.

“Persephone!” I hear a familiar cry.

It was Demeter, my mother.

I hid the paper and ran toward the cry.

She had found me.

Hades and Demeter made an agreement for me.

Six months on earth, six months in the underworld.

“Soon, my love. I will see you, soon,” my mother says, embracing me before she leaves.

I weep for her.

“Kore!” Hades yells.

And I go to him, my feet so heavy as I take each step—-and I breathe in like lead, feeling as though I will collapse. But I do not.

——————————-

In the morning, I awaken, and find myself in solitude.

I breathe quietly, and read the paper I found before.

My darling,

I know this is a dream,

But through a cave

Near the volcanic lake, Avernus,

Where I live near Naples,

I leave you these messages in hopes

We can meet, I am human,

My name is Matteo—

And I love you.

I search endlessly for this place. All over underworld.

I have made friends with Cerberus, and he does not alert Hades to my plan.

As I now recognize the warning, I do not eat the pomegranate seeds from Hades, as I realized that would only further my incarceration here.

I find myself lurking through a wet, dark cave, and then green.

Blue.

Yellow.

Gold.

It’s earth.

It is fall, but I feel the sun’s rays hit my cold face.

I call out to him.

“Matteo! It is I, Goddess of spring, Persephone.”

I look at my robes, satin and pink. They are singed on the bottom.

“Yes, I am Matteo. Will spring come forth? Or is it just my heart blossoming at the sight of your lovely face?”

I turn around at his words, and I see him.

His eyes are what I see.

Brown, almond shaped, kind, and warm. His olive skin, sweet smile, and curly brown hair enraptured me, and I smiled.

“How did you know of me? Of where I was?” I asked him, and he walked closer, though he with trepidation, he seemed to only offer respect.

“I was in town when an old woman was calling for you. She asked of you all over my town, and nearby towns. She was your mother, I believe. And she was crying.” He said with a sigh. “And as I encountered this unconditional doting loyalty, her love for you, I fell for you, and I wished and longed for us to meet.”

Love consumed my entire being. I took his hand as we drew closer. The music that seemed to trap me in my broken heart before seemed to fill me now with hope, and with beautiful, joyful words.

“How can you fall for me when you do not know me at all?” I asked.

“Because you are my dream,” he said softly, caressing my face.

We talked for hours, on a grassy knoll far away from the cave, and had much in common.

He gave me a swirling liquid in a glass, and I knew it was wine.

“My grandfather makes wine. It is a brand new red from Venice, and I brought it to you. It is called Merlot. Let’s toast to each other, and to a new spring.”

“This is our time. This first date marks when we have met, and our first real discussion, yet here with you... even as different as we are, you a human, me, a Goddess, I feel that we are one,” I said, and he agreed.

He had a violin and played me a traditional Greek dance song.

I danced and we laughed, and then to silence, we held each other.

“I always believed that life and death were two parts of the same whole. Like love and hate made up the sum of human emotions,” I said, exhausted of our time together, yet I felt incredibly rejuvenated. “But, I realize that it is more complicated than that. Life is. I am more complicated. Humans are, as well. They deserve better in the afterlife than what we offer them in the underworld. I must go back, and change things. But, I will come back for you, Matteo.”

And finally, in a sorrowful embrace, we kiss.

In the dim light, I kissed the sun farewell, and embraced the shadows—-to make the darkness my home truly, but also to secure my return to my love, who showed me that dreams can come true.

I will no longer pick the narcissis flower on earth but the marigold. Of the golden hues of summer and of life, it will renew me and you in our new life…

On one golden summer day, that’ll last forever, my love.