Hades: Persephone the Runaway
Atop the many levels of the Underworld; beyond the dark caves of Tartarus, the flaming pits of Asphodel, and the ghostly glories of Elysium’s halls, a garden grows. Barley, cabbage, corn, lemons, tomatoes and countless other plants thrive, changing by the season and leaving by the basketful. A small cottage, covered with moss and streams of ivy, rests among them. Here is where Persephone thrives.
Persephone never really knew peace most of her life. Instead she was always contending for the egos of those she loved, be it arguing, negotiating or running. Life at the hidden cottage wasn’t so completely different from most of her life in this way. Being here was another consequence she was dealt for the sake of others. However, at least this time she was mostly unbothered.
Whether it be Greece from Tartarus, or New York from Ohio, Persephone is the partner who escaped from an unhealthy relationship. She is the daughter who never was given a place to call home when she was with her mother. She is the friend who was tired of being tokenized. She is the transgender who decided enough was enough.
Persephone is the runaway who shows running is just as difficult as staying. She was the only one that left and held strong to her boundaries. She still held onto the memories, both of those she loved and those who left her in pain. They were too deeply entangled to separate from each other. Some days she would reminisce on those pieces of the past that made her smile and wondered if leaving was the right thing to do. That is one of the most difficult parts about running away: what you left behind doesn’t just disappear, it returns in some way or another.
One day a young man appears before her, stating his identity as that of her son. This was the boy who died in her arms at birth. This was the child from her confused relationship with Hades, the kind of the underworld. This was the death that pushed her for the last time to leave the underworld and everyone behind. Yet here he was, standing there, asking her questions that she could never conceive needing to be answered.
He tells her that he has been alive all this time, and that he has struggled for so long just to finally see her. He tells her of all the trials he traversed, each successively pinging with a different spike of anxiety; his father and her ex-lover trapping him down in the underworld, old family members who she continued to hide from helping him along the way, and most of all that he wanted her to come back with him.
“It’s time for you to come back home”, he says.
At least the dog was doing okay.
Of course, this wasn’t the first time Persephone had someone ask her to come back. Part of running away is being prepared for many to ask you to return. The foundation of choosing to leave is in the fact that there is no better option. There isn’t a way that anyone’s mind can be changed. There isn’t enough space to heal from the trauma inflicted from remaining in that space.
These aren’t baseless excuses, these are understandings formed from trying to survive inside violent spaces for so long in her life. These are understandings that enabled her to continue living on her own terms.
However, justifying to a loved one that you can’t go back isn’t as easy as knowing that you can’t go back, especially for one who had no agency in the construction of your pain. How could Persephone have Zagreus understand that she couldn’t go back? It wasn’t that it was impossible, but it was ill-fated.
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