The Two Persephones

A yellow aura
Cleanses you,
You are pure.
You are the
Principle in which I
Sought for,
The inferno in your
Eyes do not waver,
The vigilance in your
Voice does not falter.

In July,
You become a Goddess.
I name you daughter, daughter
You are mine.
I did not deliver you from my
Womb,
It is a virgin.
Another bore you into
This austere business,
We plucked you from your
Public Hell in
Exchange for your pink sister.

The grass leaves their
Mark upon my ample arm;
I presume your limbs also
Illustrated their residence,
A picture of aptness without
Men,
Sisters,
Relatives or
Fears—
We lay supple as twin Persephones.
Fair light clashed against bottle green radicals,
There,
I love you.

It was your
Ultimate summer,
The closing of a
Act II,
Act III was plagued by
Death and his dour whore
Winter,
Ailments of the heart,
Mind,
And stomach were
Common,
I tried to guard you.

Darling,
I was a dreadful parent.
Those dismal days
Brooded as
Seething deities,
As a student, I
Was inattentive with
Diverse responsibilities,
Yet
Your ailment was my folly.
I did not protect you.
I did not soothe you.
When they
Spoke in hushed voices
I foresaw your death:
Still, still,
A bag of fur and flesh,
No, no—
I brushed my suicide aside.
You were living.

My temptress, Evening,
Overcame day,
My hand was thick on the
Knob and bile
Endangered my diseased neck,
There are the doves!
The younger one’s eyes
Were blotchy and red,
The elder was stern with,
I assumed, shifty
Compassion,
I cried;

Where is she?

I am sorry, I am sorry.

They replied.
My black eyes were
Fevered with panic,
You were not present.

That bastard buried you,
I absurdly believed,
Alive,
The child possessed me
With affection and the
Elders were stern with,
I assumed, shifty
Compassion,
You died when the
Sun Idol rested his head.
He gave up on you.
Not I,
O’ God,
Not I.

Our vehicle wasn’t
Adequate,
I failed you by an hour.
Oh,
Daughter,
Daughter I
Discard you with
Strangers,
I used to visit your grave.
It is a year and I
Thrive with pathetic spirits
At the sight of
Blonde chopped hair,
You are following me.
(I thought I saw
You crouched on the stair).

In July,
You were a Goddess.
You were an audacious
Persephone engaged beneath
The sun and the
Cerulean eyes of God,
I was Demeter with
My pocketful of wheat and
Barrels of honey,
That shadowed tree, Medusa’s,
Was my hungered
Suspicion,
The cringing branch was Death falling in love.