by Daisy Dunn
I heard the sound of her crying, but I couldn’t see
who it was; I’m telling you everything I know.’
Hecatē said this, and received not one word in reply:
instead, Demeter rushed her away, and the pair of them
soon reached Helios, the watcher of gods and men.
Demeter stopped by his horses, and spoke to him from there.
‘If ever I have pleased you, Helios, or if ever
I have done you a favour, do this one for me now:
my daughter’s voice was lost on the trackless air,
shrill with distress; I heard, but looked and saw nothing.
You gaze down all day from the broad sky,
and see everything on dry land and the ocean:
so if you have seen who forced away my child
from me, and who went off with her, whether
a man or a god, please, quickly, just tell me.’
She said this, and the son of Hyperion replied:
‘Holy Demeter, daughter of Rhea with her long hair,
you are going to hear it all – for I think highly
of you and, yes, I pity you, grieving as you are
for the loss of your skinny-legged little girl. So:
of all the immortal gods, none other is responsible
than the master of the clouds, Zeus himself, who gave her
to Hades his brother to call his own
as a beautiful wife. Hades with his team of horses
snatched her, and dragged her to the thickening dark
as she cried and cried. But come now; you are a goddess:
call an end to this huge sorrow; be reasonable:
there is no need for such uncontrollable rage.
Hades, the lord of millions, is hardly, after all,
the worst son-in-law amongst the immortals,
and he is your own flesh and blood, your own brother.
As for his position – well, he has what was allotted
originally when things were split three ways,
the master of those amongst whom he dwells.’
So saying, Helios took up the reins, and his horses
were away all at once, bearing up the chariot
like birds with slender wings. And now grief fastened
– a harsher, a more dreadful pain – at Demeter’s heart.
Furious with the black cloud-god, the son of Cronos,
she abandoned the gods’ city, and high Olympus,
to travel through rich fields and the towns of men,
changing her face, wiping all its beauty away,
so that nobody, neither man nor woman, when
they saw her could recognise her for a goddess.
She wandered a long time, until she came to the home
at Eleusis of the good man Celeus, master there.
Heartsore, heart-sorry, Demeter stopped by the roadside
at the well they called the Maiden’s Well, where people
from the town would come for water; sat in the shade
cast over her by heavy branches of olive,
and looked for all the world like a very old lady,
one long past childbearing or the gifts of love,
just like a nurse who might care for the children
of royalty, or a housekeeper in their busy house.
The daughters of Celeus caught sight of her as they came
that way to draw water, and carry it back
to their father’s place in great big pitchers of bronze:
Callidicē and Clisidicē, beautiful Dēmō
and Callithoē, the eldest girl of all four,
more like goddesses in the first flower of youth.
They had no idea who she was – it’s hard for people
to recognise gods – so they came straight up to her
and demanded, ‘Madam, where have you come from
and who, of all the old women here, are you?
Why is it that you’ve walked out past the town
and don’t go to its houses? Plenty of ladies
the same age as you, and others who are younger,
are there now, in buildings sheltered from the heat,
to welcome you with a kind word and a kind turn.’
When they had done, the royal goddess replied:
‘Good day to you, girls, whoever you may be;
I’ll tell you what you want to know, for it’s surely
not wrong, when you’re asked, to explain the truth.
I am called Grace – my mother gave me that name –
and I have travelled on the broad back of the sea
all the way from Crete – not wanting to, but forced
to make the journey by men who had snatched me,
gangsters, all of them. In that fast ship of theirs
they put in at Thoricos, where the women
disembarked together, and they themselves began
making their supper down by the stern-cables.
But I had no appetite for any meal that they made,
and when their backs were turned I disappeared
into dark country, and escaped from those men
before they could sell me, stolen goods, at a
good price, bullies and fixers that they were.
That’s how I arrived like a vagrant, and I
don’t know what country it is, or who lives here.
May the gods who have their homes on Olympus
send you good husbands and plenty of children
to please the parents; but now, spare a thought
for me, like the well brought-up girls that you are,
and maybe I can come to one of your houses
to do some honest work for the ladies and gentlemen
living there, the kind of thing a woman of my age
does best: I can nurse a new baby, and hold
him safe in my arms; I can keep the place clean;
I can make up the master’s bed in a corner
of the great bedchamber, and give all the right
instructions to serving women in the house.’
It was the goddess who said this; immediately
the girl Callidicē, loveliest of Celeus’ daughters,
spoke back to her, calling her Grandma, and saying:
‘Whatever the gods give, however grievous the hardship,
people put up with it, as they must, for the gods
are that much stronger: it’s just how things are.
But something I can do is tell you the names
of men who have power and prestige in this town,
who keep its walls in good shape, whose decisions
count for much, and whose advice is listened to here:
wise Triptolemus and Diocles, that good man
Eumolpus, then Polyxeinus, and Dolichus,
and our own dear father of course, all have
wives kept busy with the care of their houses;
not one of them would take a dislike to you
and turn you away from the door – they would welcome
you in, for there is something special about you.
Stay here, if you will, and we’ll all run back
to tell our mother, Metaneira, the whole story,
then see whether she’ll suggest that you come
to ours, and not go looking for another home.
She has a new baby in the house now, a son
born later in life, hoped for and prayed for:
if you were to take care of him, and see him through
to manhood, you would be the envy of any
woman, so well would that childcare be paid.’
Demeter simply nodded her head, and the girls
filled their shiny pitchers up with fresh water
and carried them away, their heads held high.
Soon they were at the family home, where they told
their mother all they had seen, all they had heard.
; She ordered them to hurry back, and request this woman
to come and work for a good wage. So then
like deer, or like young calves in springtime,
happy and well-fed, running around in the fields,
they pulled up the folds of their long dresses
and dashed down the cart-track; the long hair,
yellow as saffron, streamed back over their shoulders.
They found Demeter where they had left her, by the road,
and they led her then towards their father’s house
while she walked a little way behind, troubled at heart,
her head veiled, and with the dark dress fluttering
this way and that over her slender legs.
They got back to Celeus’ house, and went in
through the hallway, where their mother was waiting,
seated by a pillar that held up the strong roof,
with her child, the new son and heir, at her breast.
The girls ran straight to her: slowly Demeter placed
a foot over the threshold, her head touched the rafters,
and around her the entire doorway lit up.
Astonishment and draining fear together shook
Metaneira; she gave up her couch to the visitor
and invited her to sit. But Demeter, who brings
the seasons round, and brings gifts with the seasons,
had no wish to relax on that royal couch, and she
maintained her silence, with eyes fixed on the floor,
until Iambe came up, mindful of her duty,
and offered a low stool, which she had covered
with a sheep’s white fleece. The goddess
sat down now, and with one hand she drew
the veil across her face; and there she remained,
sunk in her quiet grief, giving to no one
so much as a word or a sign, sitting on there
without a smile, accepting neither food nor drink
for an age, as she pined for her beautiful daughter,
until Iambe, resourceful as ever, took
her mind off things with jokes and funny stories,
making her smile first, then laugh, and feel better,
and Metaneira offered her the cup she had filled
with wine, sweet as honey: but she shook her head
and announced that, for her, it was not proper now
to take wine – instead, she asked Metaneira
to give her some barley-water and pennyroyal
mixed up together: the queen made this, and served it
to the great goddess, to Demeter,
who accepted it solemnly, and drank it down.
Only then did Metaneira begin to speak:
‘Madam, you are welcome here; all the more so
for coming from no ordinary stock
but, I’d say, from the best – for your every glance
is full of modesty and grace, you have something
almost royal about you. But what the gods give us,
hard though it is, we mere human beings
endure: all our necks are under that yoke.
You are here now, and whatever is mine shall be yours.
This little boy – my last born, scarcely hoped for,
granted me by the gods only after much prayer –
nurse him for me now, and if you raise him
to be a healthy, strong man, then any woman
at all will be jealous to see you, so great
will be the reward I give you for your work.’
Demeter replied: ‘Accept my greetings, good lady,
and may the gods be kind to you. I will indeed
take care of this fine boy of yours, as you ask.
I shall rear him, and neglect nothing: sudden sickness
will never harm him, and never will some witch
of the forest, who taps roots for magic or poison,
touch a single hair of his head; for I know
stronger sources to tap, and I know the remedy
for all such assaults: a sure one, unfailing.’
Then with her two arms, the arms of a goddess,
she drew the baby in close to her own bosom,
and its mother smiled at the sight. In the big house
from then on Demeter looked after the son
of Celeus and Metaneira, while he grew up
at a god’s rate, not eating solids, or taking
milk, but fed by her with ambrosia, as if
he were indeed a god, born of a god;
she breathed gently over him and kept him close,
and at night, unknown to anyone, she smuggled him
into the burning fire, like a new log of wood.
He was thriving so well, and looking so much more
than a human child, that both the parents were amazed.
And the goddess Demeter would have delivered him
from age and from death, had not Metaneira
been up one night and, without so much as
giving it a thought, from her own bedroom
looked into the hall: in sheer terror for the child
she screamed, and did her best to raise the alarm,
seeing the worst and believing it, she called out
to her little boy, half-keening: ‘Demophoön,
my own baby, this stranger is hiding you
in the big fire, she’s the one making my voice shrill
with pain, ‘Demophoön, my darling, my child.’
She cried all this out, and the goddess heard her.
Furious that instant, mighty Demeter
took the child – their last born, scarcely hoped for –
and with her own immortal hands she brought him
out of the fire, set him gently on the floor,
then, brimming with anger, turned on Metaneira:
‘You stupid creatures, you witless and ignorant
humans, blind to the good as well as the bad
things in store for you, and no use to each other:
I swear to you here, as gods do, by the rippling
dark waters of Styx, that I would have made
this child of yours immortal, honoured, a man
untouched by age for eternity; but nothing now
can keep the years back, or keep death from him.
There is one mark of honour that will always be his:
because he once slept in my arms, and lay in my lap,
all the young men at Eleusis, at the set time
each year, as their scared duty, will gather
for the sham fight, and stage that battle forever.
For I am Demeter, proud of my own honours
as the bringer of joy to the gods, and of blessings
to mortal men. Everyone now has to build me
a spacious temple, with its altar underneath,
by the steep walls of your city, where a hill
rises just above the Maidens’ Well. The rites
will be as I instruct, when I teach you the ways
to calm my anger, and be good servants to me.’
And with that, instantly the goddess changed form –
her height, her whole appearance – shuffling away
old age, so that sheer beauty blazed and spread
in and around her; from her robes a gorgeous perfume
drifted, and from her immortal flesh there came
pure light, with the reach of moonbeams; her hair
flashed over her shoulders, and the entire house
was flooded with a sudden brilliance of lightning
as she stepped out through the hall. Metaneira’s
knees went from beneath her, and for an age
she sat there speechless, not even thinking
to pick that dear child of hers up from the floor.
When his sisters heard the boy starting to cry
they jumped straight out of their beds, and one
caught him
up in her arms, and held him close,
while another stoked the fire, and a third
dashed on bare feet to take hold of her mother
and help her away. As the girls huddled round him,
trying to comfort him and dab his skin clean,
the baby wriggled and fretted, knowing full well
these nurses were hardly the kind he was used to.
That whole night long, shaking with fear, the women
did their best to appease the great goddess.
When dawn came at last, they told everything
to Celeus, exactly as Demeter had instructed,
and he, as their ruler, lost no time
in calling the citizens together, and giving them
the order to build the goddess her temple
and to put her altar just where the hill rises.
They listened to him, and they did all that he said,
so that a temple rose up, as the goddess required.
When the job was done, and the people stopped working,
they all went home; but golden Demeter
installed herself in her temple, apart from the other gods,
and stayed there, eaten up with grief for her daughter.
She made that year the worst for people living
on the good earth, the worst and the hardest: not one
little seed could poke its head up from the soil,
for Demeter had smothered them all; the oxen
broke their ploughs and twisted them, scraping
across hardened furrows; and all the white barley
that year was sown in vain. She would have destroyed
every single human being in the world
with this famine, just to spite the gods on Olympus,
had not Zeus decided to intervene: first
he dispatched Iris, on her wings the colour of gold,
to give Demeter his orders, and she did as he asked,
covering the distance in no time, and landing
at Eleusis, where the air was filled with incense.
She found Demeter wearing dark robes in the temple,
and spoke to her urgently: ‘Zeus, our father
who knows everything, summons you back now
to join the family of the immortal gods:
come quick, don’t let his command be in vain.’
But her pleas had no effect at all on Demeter:
then Zeus sent out all of the gods, one by one,
to deliver his summons, bringing the best of gifts,
with whatever fresh honours she might desire;
but Demeter was so furious then that she
dismissed every speech out of hand, and told them all
that she would neither set foot again
on Olympus, nor let anything grow on the earth,
unless she could see her beautiful daughter once more.