that the wide sky and the earth, even the salt waves

of the sea lit up, as though they were all smiling.

The girl was dazzled; she reached out with both hands

to gather up the brilliant thing; but then the earth

opened, the earth’s surface with its level roads

buckled, there on the plain of Nysa, and up from below

rushed at her, driving his horses, the king of the dead.

He snatched her up, struggling, and he drove her away

in his golden chariot as she wailed and shrieked

and called out loud to her father to help her,

to Zeus, the highest of high powers;

yet nobody – not one god, not one human being,

not even the laden olive-trees – paid heed to her;

but from deep in a cave, the young night-goddess

Hecatē, Perses’ daughter, in her white linen veil,

could hear the child’s cries; and so could the god Helios

– god of the Sun, like his father Hyperion –

hear the girl screaming for help to Zeus, her own father:

Zeus, who was keeping his distance, apart from the gods,

busy in a temple, taking stock there of the fine

offerings and the prayers of mortal men.

For all her struggling, it was with the connivance of Zeus

that this prince of the teeming dark, the god with many titles,

her own uncle, with his team of unstoppable horses

took away the little girl: she, as long as she kept in sight

the earth and the starry night sky, the sun’s day-beams

and the seas pulled by tides and swimming in fish,

still hoped, hoped even now to see her mother again

and get back to her family of the eternal gods.

From the mountain tops to the bottom of the sea, her voice

echoed, a goddess’s voice; and, when her mother heard

those cries, pain suddenly jabbed at her heart: she tore

in two the veil that covered her perfumed hair,

threw a dark shawl across her shoulders, and shot

out like a bird across dry land and water,

frantic to search; but nobody – neither god, nor human –

was ready to tell her what had happened, not even

a solitary bird would give Demeter the news.

For nine whole days, with a blazing torch in each hand,

the goddess roamed the earth, not touching, in her grief,

either the gods’ food or their drink, ambrosia or nectar,

and not stopping even to splash her skin with water.

On the tenth day, at the first blink of dawn, Hecatē

came to help her, carrying torches of her own,

and gave her first what news she could: ‘Royal Demeter,

bringer of seasons, and all the gifts the seasons bring,

what god in heaven, or what man on this earth

can have snatched away Persephone, and broken your heart?

I heard the sound of her crying, but I couldn’t see

who it was; I’m telling you everything I know.’