Peresphone's return

Persephone's return


Glowing screens abduct
Young brains, lure them
With seeds of over stimulation
Prisoner to the stupor of excesses
Until they are queens of this alternate world


She lives there far away
Shedding innocence, presence
Along the way
Price of a fantastical occupation
Lost to real play


While Demeter searches high, low
For her little girl , lost to this world
Where neither the pleading, cajoling
Nor the threats , secure her release
Until the ultimatum


And then for a brief period
Her child is returned to her
She runs on the grass
Chases butterflies
Finds her innocence , her childhood
And the world rejoices
In their meeting


It takes love, a mother's steady refusal
To give up on the best in you
Her refusal to accept anything less
To release you , from the prison of your own fears, boredom
To put a spring in your step
To return spring to a waiting earth


And yet she returns to her glowing prison
From time to time, to queen over a new level
And her mother waits
Knowing she will return , for a while
To be her child again
To dance , bring joy, plenty
And mother, screen coexist in uneasy acceptance.


--shubha




P.S. Trying to describe a modern mother's frustration with a child's screen addiction , tying it to the Greek myth of Persephone , Daughter of Zeus and Demeter, the goddess of fertility who was abducted by Hades , the king of the Netherworld . Demeter wins her daughter's release for six months of the year and her coming is spring , but as she accepted some pomegranate seeds from Hades , Persephone returns to the Netherworld for six months when the plants sleep , awaiting her return .