Persephone Falling Essay

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In Rita Dove’s poem, “Persephone, Falling,” the reader is introduced to a new spin on the old story of Persephone and her unfortunate yearly trip to the underground. (The title is an allusion to the Persephone myth; Hades, king of the underground, captures Persephone. While Persephone is there, her mother Demeter (goddess of the harvest) is so distraught that she will not let anything grow. The other gods persuade Hades to allow Persephone to return to the world and her mother—but, unfortunately, Persephone has eaten six pomegranate seeds and must stay in Hades one month for every seed she has eaten. During those long months she is away from her mother, it is winter and nothing will grow because her mother is mourning.) The speaker begins with an image that’s out of the ordinary: a flower that is seemingly more beautiful than the other “ordinary beautiful” flowers (1). The reader’s attention is drawn to this fact by the exclamation mark and caesura in the second line—the narcissus that Persephone spots is clearly worth of her attention. Persephone feels this flower is worthy of her “stoop[ing] to pull harder--” and yet, the pulling is somehow interrupted. The line itself breaks off with a dash and a warning of something more sinister to come(3). The tense shifts, as does the mood of the poem: Hades (although not explicitly referred to by name) is “sprung out of the earth” (4). The use of passive voice suggests that he is almost compelled out of the earth by some unseen force. His carriage is both “glittering and terrible”—words which give the reader a sense of confusion due to their connotations (5). “Glittering” suggestions something special, awe-inspiring, wealthy, and bright, while “terrible” suggests something ominous, awe-inspiring, and awful. After Persephone is claimed, the tense shifts again—this time to present voice (“it is finished”). The

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