The Changing Season

You know me as a girl, green

and gold, innocent, and then

stolen away,

tricked out of her own happiness.

You have been told

six seeds sealed my fate, earned

my mother’s wrath, her raging

grief hollowing her

soul and bone,

but now I tell you this with a smile:

it was my doing.

I crossed the river,

I let my mouth run red,

I kissed the king of darkness,

eased laughter out of his defenses,

until — of all things —

love bloomed.

Here I sit, a queen, this throne of bones

my own, while legend

would have me cower, violate me

to make me worthy to rule —

but you know the real story now,

and once you return, Orpheus,

give the world

my true song.