She was wooed by different gods, but her mother chased them all off. At Zeus's bidding, Hades, the Lord of the Underworld, kidnapped Persephone, taking her to his dark lair. The crops withered or some such, and the potential starvation of the people convinced Zeus to make Hades return Persephone. There was some daft rule that anyone who had consumed food in the Underworld was forced to remain there. Tricky Hades had managed to persuade Persephone to eat four pomegranate seeds. This small consumption forced her to return to the Underworld for a period of each year, and that happened to coincide when the earth becomes barren!
I, too, have been cast in to my own personal hell. My naturopath informs me that pomegranates are inflammatory to my blood type (AB positive).
No... NO... NOOOOO!!!
And now for some art to soothe the soul... Dante Gabriel Rossetti's painting of Persephone (1874). His model was Jane Morris (William Morris's wife and Rossetti's mistress). See the pom in her hand? Lucky! I have a good poster of this framed in my living room. Who said that after the age of 30 you shouldn't have reproduction art in your home? Not me.
Sigh. The occasional bit won't hurt, but it won't be... like it was.
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