Persephone

They crowned her queen of ash and grief,

with nettles in her hair,

and whispered, “See the dark you cast—

it’s you who put it there.”

They fed her light in measured sips,

and named her shadow’s source;

they built a cage of borrowed blame

and called it love’s remorse.

She learned to bloom without the sun,

to smile through shallow breath;

they taught her beauty’s price was pain,

and silence sounded best.

Then from below, a murmur came,

a voice both fierce and kind;

she thought it love, yet knew its weight—

a hunger of the mind.

He offered peace beneath the ground,

a crown of coal and flame;

she followed down on trembling feet,

half mercy, half her shame.

The air was thick with sweet decay,

the dark a siren’s hymn;

she built her throne from all her faults

and called it home with him.

New hope was born beneath that gloom,

a spark in endless night;

she swore to keep it from her pain,

to hide it from the blight.

Above, Demeter’s weathered hands

still sowed the seeds of dawn;

Persephone loosened her child,

unsure if she’d live on.

“Let me end where no one sees;

he’ll find a brighter day—

a mother made of straw and grain,

not cinders that betray.”

Her heartbeat stalled; the river sealed

its ledger with her name;

she sank beneath her own regret,

too weary now for flame.

But through the dark a laughter dripped—

bright resin through the stone;

the sound she feared would scorch her whole

now pulled her flesh and bone.

She clawed through root, through guilt and shale,

through all the shame that would not yield;

the dark screamed “Stay!”—but love replied,

“Come home; your wounds will heal.”

Earth gave way to breath and bloom;

she rose, nettled crown in hand;

no gilded throne, just loam and sky,

and stars that understand.

Yet each returning autumn moon

she tastes the seeds she chose;

one bite of coal, one sip of light—

forever shame’s repose.

___________________

“Persephone” is a poem I wrote about the journey from darkness into light — from surviving abuse to finding my strength through motherhood. It explores how post-partum depression can feel like the end of us, like we’ve been buried beneath the weight of everything we’ve endured, yet somehow keep breathing, keep reaching for the sun.

I used the myth of Persephone as a mirror for that transformation: a woman who is forced into shadow, but learns to rise from it, crowned not in gold, but in resilience. This poem is for every mother who has felt lost in the dark — a reminder that even when we break, we are still capable of rebirth.