Persephone Naps and Saves the Dead, by Polly Hansen

Persephone, by Thomas Hart Benton (USA) 1938

 
Persephone Naps and Saves the Dead
​
She was sleeping naked under his tree, so the old farmer took her, harvested her like wheat, muffled her nose and mouth with his tough, massive hand as he pulled her to his waiting cart. There was nothing she could do, couldn’t kick or scream because the scent of the earth on his palm gave off the odor of night and darkness, and so that’s where she thought she was—asleep. 
 
The moss upon which she’d slept curled softly around her hips and feet, but as soon as her skin left the touch of the furry green, her limbs grew chill, and she struggled to wake. But wake she did not. Not until she was six feet under, twenty feet, thirty feet, right down to the center of the earth.
            
He was not an unkind man, except that he stole her away from the day’s beauty; not cruel in that he didn’t hurt her, except to remove her from all that she wanted, which was to relish that one afternoon away from the sweltering kitchen on that late summer day when the heat rose in waves off the treetops and fields, and birds took shelter in the branches, making the leaves tremble with the flutter of their wings. 
 
She had longed to escape that smelly kitchen where potato peels and gristle piled up on plates. That afternoon, standing at the sink, washing that unending stack of dishes, she saw it in the distance as if for the first time--a tree springing from the center of that flat, dry field, offering the promise of shade and relief. 
 
She turned off the spigot, untied her apron, slipped on her old, black pumps, opened the back door and stepped into the hot, hot sun. The tall, brittle grass scratched her ankles and calves as she trudged towards the ancient oak, its limbs stretching wide, inviting her to partake of its shade. How many times had she looked out the window without really seeing it? Why, in all her years of washing dish after dish, her hands scorched and sore, had she never considered throwing down her rag and crossing the hot, dry field to investigate that enormous grandfather of a tree?
            
Her mind had been stuck ever since her last day as chambermaid. She’d gone upstairs to her master’s bedroom to clean the fireplace when she saw his delightful, huge bed, the sheets and blankets a tangle at the foot of it, the feather pillows piled high like clouds. She was so tired she couldn’t resist, and had lain down, thinking if old Betsy found her there, the woman would simply pinch her and say, get up you silly girl. But it was not old Betsy, it was plain, ugly Marta who hated Persephone because she was everything Marta was not, soft and voluptuous and curvy, but maybe a bit stupid? For what chambermaid would enter her master’s bedroom and lay on his bed and not expect trouble? And so, she told on Persephone and got her demoted to scullery maid. 
            
The dishes kept appearing. Persephone couldn’t rest until every one of them was cleaned and put away. That afternoon she had looked down at her hands bleeding into the white, sudsy water, turning the bubbles pink, then looked up and saw the tree off in the distance, standing so proud and bold and strong. 
 
The tall, brown grass crunched, and field mice squeaked and scurried away as she passed. Crows cawed and reeled overhead, screeching at her disturbance, for when had anyone ever crossed the field? They couldn’t remember. 
 
The moment she stepped out of that hot, blazing sun that scorched the top of her head and the back of her neck and into the shade, it was like sinking a burning finger into snow. The perfumed air smelled like every honeysuckle blossom she’d ever sipped as a child, like roses and hyacinth, like geraniums and marigolds. 
 
And before you know it, Persephone is stripping down to her skin and settling down between the roots of that magnanimous tree. She can no more resist getting naked than she can resist breathing. The filigree of green, feather-soft whirls closes around her limbs like seaweed as she drifts off into the most languorous, delicious, eloquent sleep she’s ever known, far, far away from dishes and demands and exhaustion. 
 
The ancient farmer gazes upon her naked body sprawled out under the cool shade of his tree, his tree! How could she not expect him to take her, to drag her across his field with his big, dirty hands across her tender, full mouth? 
 
Hades takes her down, down, down into the musky, moldy dark where the dead clamor and give him no peace. 
            
Persephone wakes and cries out, sensing that this is all real, as real as the tree had been, as real as her journey across that dry field had been, and that here she is in this new place. And who is this gnarly, old man who smells of a newly dug grave? It is then she believes she is dead.
 
But he’s shaking his head and wagging a knotted finger at her.
            
“Not dead. Renewed.”
            
Persephone trembles, but only a little, for she realizes that she does feel refreshed. And yet she does not know what he has in mind. Will she be stuck down here forever just as she was at the sink?
 
“Where are my clothes?” No sooner does she say this than she is draped in a shimmering gown the color of new ferns unfurling. She breathes in its scent of spring rain. A soft, green light emanates from her dress, and not just that, but her skin, her eyes, her hair.
            
They stare at one another, the old man and the young woman, and reach a truce for she realizes what he offers—a life of purpose. 
 
“Show me where we are,” she says.

Hades leads her through his vast halls where legions of the dead cry out. Persephone takes pity on their poor, hungry souls and spreads her arms wide, shaking green over the hordes. Moss springs up from the ground where the dead stand and curls under their limbs like soft kittens. The dead grow sleepy, sigh, and fall to the ground, smiles on their faces. No worries, no concerns, just gentle slumber until their bodies turn into ash, and a wind blows through the great halls, and the air fills with the dust of the dead, spreading it over the dry, brittle field above where tendrils of green sprout from the earth, and the mice delight in having new shoots to eat, and the earthworms gambol in the moist soil, and the great tree spreads its limbs, shedding bounty.

Polly Hansen

Polly Hansen is a flutist and writer. Her first job out of graduate school after experiencing homelessness and trafficking was as editor of a flute magazine, which launched her career in publishing. Today, she produces two nationally syndicated, weekly radio programs. She’s published in Newsweek, The Sun, LIT Magazine, and numerous literary journals. She lives in Asheville, North Carolina, with her husband and two black dogs often mistaken for small black bears on leashes. You can learn about her memoir at pollyhansen.com.