The myth of Pluto and Persephone tells about the seasons of the year and also gives an understanding of how myths change to help us understand the evolution of humans.
Persephone, daughter of Demeter, was a beautiful full spirited Goddess. The love that flowed between Mother and Daughter was so pure and joyous that wherever they walked flowers sprang from their footsteps. The Earth was covered with gardens from their radiating love.
Pluto, God of the Underworld (the unconscious and shadow self) watched Persephone and was taken by her beauty. Pluto wanted Persephone and as the shadow self waits for the opportunity to come forth, so also, did Pluto. One day Persephone was in the fields alone, gathering herbs. She had been instructed numerous times on the proper way to break the stem in harvesting and this day she was distracted. She was gathering Goldenrod and as she brought the stem to her basket the whole plant, roots and all came forth. This was the opportunity that Pluto had been waiting for and he came rushing forth from the Underworld with his 6 black stallions, swooping up Persephone in his wake and quickly returning with her to his realm.
When Persephone didn’t return Demeter went to look for her. She looked and looked, asking everyone if they had seen her beloved. No one had. After a time Demeter’s grieve over the loss of her most beloved daughter became so great that now where she walked in her unending search, the ground froze and the mists that had nourished the glistening emerald plants now turned to ice. The plants could not survive in such severity and they shriveled and died. The people grew hungry.
Finally, Demeter sent word to Zeus, highest of the Gods. Zeus, who saw all, had indeed observed the snatching away of Persephone. He agreed to send two nymphs to talk with Pluto. Persephone knew that if she accepted any gift from Pluto she would forever be his captive. Because she was strong in her own power she did not accept one thing that was Pluto’s and when Zeus’s messengers came Pluto had to release the woman that had given new meaning to his passion.
As Persephone walked with the nymphs from the Underworld they could see she was weak; she had not had anything to drink or eat in a very long time. They offered her a pomegranate and she ate of the fruit. She did not know that the nymphs had taken the fruit from Pluto and unaware she had accepted a gift from Pluto.
Pluto came to Zeus and an agreement was made. Because Persephone accepted his gift she would now spend half the year with Pluto in the Underworld and half the year with her Beloved Mother upon the Earth. From this story we understand how the Seasons were created. We can also recognize that this story came from the beginning of the Patriarch. The women lost their power to make decisions for themselves.
It is now time to rewrite the way of the feminine choice. After all, it has been eons that Pluto has bestowed his love upon Persephone and she has found power in the darkness. As Persephone begins her journey to the Underworld each Fall Equinox and finds herself in the passionate arms of her lover each Winter Solstice we know that it is time for us to find our own passion by looking within and attuning to what of our unconscious needs to come to the light. What surrendering will lighten our load to come more fully into our power?
Persephone is Queen in the Underworld. She is adored and adorned by Pluto. Their melded passion brings new life force to the creativeness of the unconscious. And when Persephone returns to the Earth on the Spring Equinox she brings that creativeness to consciousness. Just a Persephone now embraces her time with Pluto we see that embracing our unconsciousness, not being afraid of the dark shadows within, brings us ultimately more power and more ability to live in the moment—being conscious. Resistance and denial only keep us from our own joy.
On Summer Solstice Demeter and Persephone dance together in the glory of conscious manifestation, just as we do when we embrace the whole cycle. Manifesting in the light is only as powerful as embracing the dark.
Lyn Goldberg
