What it means
Demeter is Persephone’s mother. You may recall Persephone was lured into the underworld by Hades. Because she ate three pomegranate seeds, she had to stay there three months of every year. So, this poem starts at that moment of transition, when Persephone is allowed back out and spring can come again.
A mother has almost lost her daughter to prostitution and drugs “black sex and white powder.” The mother does not judge her daughter, but also does not assume everything will go smoothly. She reclaims her and starts them back on the journey to health and love.
Why I like it
This poem does what I love to do in my work—retell a modern myth, intermingle the mythic and the modern, resee the myth from a new perspective. Daisy Fried actually recommended I read it as a model for what I’m doing.
I’m awed by the restraint in this poem. It’s like the speaker is telling us about this moment from just to the side of it because if she spoke from the center, she would just rant with anguish.
I like how the displacement works both ways. On the one hand, it is a completely modern story—the only reference to the mythic the title and last line, which could be read as metaphoric. Ostriker doesn’t get cute with adding in lots of mythic references, like I might be guilty of. The story stands on its own modern feet. On the other hand, I now think of the myth as an allegory for losing your child to danger, to drugs, etc. I like how I’m getting something new in both directions.
Craft
Nice objective correlative—that’s when you use objects to show the feelings. So, instead of saying the mother is enraged or hissing, we give it to the sky. All the anger words are still there, just a bit offset. More subtle.
The tone switch in the last stanza knocks my socks off. I can just hear a mother say “get in the car” with absolute authority, almost like the mother was pissed off at the kid, and the kid better get moving or else. And then that last line, the mother’s aside to us, her incredible relief. I break into blossom every time I read that line.