PERSEPHONE IN THE BIG CITY
"In this column
a hole
can you see Persephone?" -- George Seferis
Poor bipolar Persephone.
When she's down in the hole
she keeps looking up
the high buildings sway
though they'll never lean past the angle
set by a pact between gravity and the eye
still she fears they'll crash
bury her alive once again
as soon as she dares to rise from that hole
but when she's up
her head begins to dance a tarentella
on its own, its orbits circling
far beyond her slender neck;
her red-stained throat a hole
still filled with pomegranate seeds.
Barbara Lefcowitz
