The man who had everything: part 4, Demeter’s apocalypse

Hades had everything.

The underworld swelled with souls,
and souls were the raw substance of his power to create.
With so many souls, he could build
worlds within worlds
within worlds.

He could populate them with any
being he could imagine or remember.
At first, he conjured his brothers and sisters.
They opened their mouths to beg forgiveness,
and his own words tumbled out.
Boring.

He returned his family to the mud
and turned his attention to fashioning
a race of beautiful, pliant servants to meet his every need.
Soon, nymphs of every size and shape gamboled through
the barren, craggy landscape of his mind.

They baked bread, they made wine,
and they coupled in every combination.
One day, his favorite nymph injured herself
when she slipped and fell from his deepest hurt.
He hated to see his creation damaged,
so he replaced his scorched, rock-strewn wilds with green, gentle fields
and blue, brightly lit skies.

In gratitude, the nymphs knelt at his feet, clamoring,
Take me, take me.
And sometimes, he did.

Hades had nothing.

To be continued…

Read Part 1
Read Part 2
Read Part 3
Read Part 5
Read Part 6
Read Part 7
Read Part 8
Read Part 9
Read Part 10
Read Part 11
Read Part 12
Read Part 13

Demeter’s Apocalypse is an ongoing experiment. The goal is to tell a complete story in a series of 15–20 standalone poems. If this sounds interesting, I hope you’ll recommend this post (by clicking the ❤ button). Thanks so much for reading.