Demeter

Once, I wished something splendid
for her; now I think, let her be joined
to any man with his nose above ground.
Each year she returns from that airless
dark as if from a devouring dream whose
memory is never quite dispersed
until it must be lived again. Sometimes,
a kind of death comes to immortals, we lose
our power, are whirled into a chaos
for which earth and sunlight are no cure.
She saves me from this, then surrenders
me to it: my daughter, who brings the flowers
back; who will be childless.