The Sacred Drama of Eleusis Act II: Persephone in the Underworld

Tartarus. In the temple of Pluto. In the semi-darkness on the right, a throne has been erected under the tree of dreams, in whose foliage one can vaguely discern the shapes of fantastical animals: lemurs, harpies, and gorgons.

Act 1

Pluto, scepter in hand, sits next to Persephone, who has fallen asleep on her throne, her head leaning against the trunk of the tree of dreams. The mystics silently lay floral offerings at the feet of the queen of the dead, who [does not] awaken from her deep sleep.

CHORUS OF THE INVISIBLE DEMONS OF TARTAROS:
Persephone's conqueror, Great Pluto,
Honor be to him!
Hell rejoices
At your wedding feast,
In a thousand bonfires of joy
Tartaros shines brightly.
Until now,
The children of the earth
In their innocence
Had escaped him.
They were too easy
For the realm of darkness.
But now, possessing
The goddess of the heights,
In immeasurable numbers
We conquer them for ourselves.
For they will draw
The mistakes of their lives
And the beauty of their forms
Into our realm.
This must be populated
With vain shadows.
You Stygian, Harpies,
You monsters, rejoice In the tree of lies.
Honor to Pluto!
Hell trembles with joy
And holds
His prey
The dark Tartarus.

PLUTO holds a black chalice and looks at the sleeping Persephone:
How beautiful in her slumber
Appears the daughter of heaven!
You are accepted into my realm
You lovely daughter of heaven,
You bright flower of the gods.
In times to come
None of the immortals
Will ever be able to see you.
So that you may never
Be lost to me:
The potion of oblivion
And blind desire
I must give you.
Crushed in this cup,
In red blood I must
The fruit consecrated to darkness.
He squeezes the juice of a pomegranate into the cup.
Memory will fade
In your soul then,
And longing for the kingdom,
To which thoughts otherwise
Could still live in you,
To rob me of my wife.
But once you have tasted
This fruit,
Even Zeus will not
Be able to snatch you away
The power that binds you.
Create a new Dionysus
The power of the father of the gods himself,
To take [you], would only
Be possible for your husband,
If he, called by you,
In the bosom of Demeter
Would come to new life.

PERSEPHONE awakening:
Where am I?
O this heavy sleep
In the arms of the ruler,
Which hold me terribly!
What has become of me?
The ominous queen
Of the realm of darkness!
Night surrounds me, Which can never end.
A people of shadows ...
And terrifying monsters
Must watch over me ...
Figures beguile me,
Woven from dreams
And from the power of lies!

CHORUS OF SHADOWS:
You see only souls in us,
Bent by the power of misfortune,
Wandering on this shore.
We want to implore
Salvation, O Queen,
From you, begging you
To lead us up
To the fields of Elysium.

PERSEPHONE:
In you I must recognize
My brothers and sisters,
And powerless to redeem you
From this abyss
I am the one who feels trapped
In the dark realm.
Your moans ring in my ears,
I feel your tears in my heart,
Like a memory from above.
But I can only ask you
To weep for me,
As I weep for you!
Nothing else can be given here
By our souls.

PLUTO:
Lift up your forehead,
Husband of Pluto,
Queen of the Dead!
No kingdom in the vast universe
Was more beautiful than yours!
I am honored in the universe,
Feared on earth.
On my altars flows
Sacrificial blood in streams.
The same honors
Will be bestowed upon you.
Persephone covers her face with her hands.
At your feet you see
The dead crowding forward
With a fervor
That is truly greater
Than that of the Olympian gods
At their sacred altars.
Behold their pleas!
The power must appear
That you may call your own here,
More powerful than that
Which belongs to the proud Demeter.
You shall assign
Eternal dwellings to the supplicants!
But now drink the potion!
It will open your understanding
To the sublime joys
Of this realm
And to the love
Which I can give you.
He hands Persephone the cup; she hesitates to take it, and finally grasps it with a mixture of curiosity and terror. At that moment, the Stygian creatures, sphinxes, and harpies begin to emit a magical glow from the tree of dreams. They open their eyes wide and stretch out their claws.

PERSEPHONE:
O strange cup!
It makes my hand tremble ...
A terrible desire
I can feel
In its red juice ...
It sparkles within,
Like wisdom that
Takes root in evil,
The seeds of the riddle fruit ...
Like terrible seeds to behold,
Sprouts of endless torment!
I will not drink! ...
But I feel
The cup sticking to my hand ...
And once you have looked
Into this black crater,
You must look again and again
To renew your gaze!
She looks into the cup a second time.
How strange: I see myself
reflected in it now!
In dark fire,
my own eyes shine back at me.
It is the fire that
From my husband's eyes,
So terribly shines upon me.
It burns in my veins,
As if a terrible arrow
Pierced my heart!
So the memory of above
Feels like terrible suffering to the soul.
I must remember the time
When on the knees
Of the heavenly mother
I played and, although
As a virgin, the husband
Was united with me.
But unknown to me
Are his name and his image
In this difficult hour.
Are dreams filling me?
Oh woe, woe, unable
To ascend
I have become forever!
So shall I forget?

CHORUS OF SHADOWS:
Do not drink, Persephone,
The red blood
In the black chalice.
And let us ascend
From Hecate's darkness
To the Elysian realm.

CHORUS OF DEMONS:
Forget, forget,
You shall drink
From this cup
And pass it to us
To drink.
To drink the power of life
We desire
From this chalice!
It burns within us
The thirst of hell,
He alone
Can quench it.

PERSEPHONE:
I myself feel thirst
At this moment!
O terrible torment
Of the memory...
Fading hope
Confuses my inner being.
Oh, may this hope be rekindled
Once again!
And if this is impossible,
Extinguish forever!
She looks into the cup a third time.

PLUTO:
The spell is working!
She enjoys the drink.

PERSEPHONE turns to Pluto:
It is an illusion, to which I am powerless to resist!
An unknown intoxication that overwhelms me!
Your color is changing, O King,
And your eyes are becoming brighter...
The diadem shines with a radiant glow!
Blue stars appear in your dark hair!
The terrible being of black Pluto
Is transformed into the beautiful Adonai...
So my husband is not lost to me?
Confused, intoxicated by his present appearance,
I can hardly believe that he
Is so terrible and beautiful at the same time,
As he now stands radiantly before me!

PLUTO:
It is I, given by Zeus
Persephone, to the virgin, eternally as husband.
Transformed into the queen of the dead
The potion you drink, and all of hell
Will then experience the joys of our marriage with us.
All the Olympians will turn pale!

Persephone closes her eyes and brings the cup to her lips, but a clap of thunder sounds, accompanied by the clanging of cymbals; in the darkness, a chariot drawn by seven dragons appears. Hecate drives it. Triptolemus sits at her right. He holds his spear like a lance in his right hand.

Act 2

The previous characters. Hecate. Triptolemus.

PLUTO rises and waves his scepter threateningly:
Who dares to enter the gates of Hell
Without my command?
He must be smashed without delay,
Should any human presume to do so alive.

HECATE: You are powerless against Triptolemus!
Demeter bathed him in fire,
And it is I myself who brought him here.
Even the strongest lightning bolts would be ineffective,
For the youth is invulnerable.

PLUTO:
So this is what you have done, you wretched woman!
Shameless spy, with your siren face!
As punishment, I will wither
The smiling mask that you deceitfully
Wear to deceive gods and men.
You shall be the terror of the earth!
Your name shall be witch and seductress!
I will carve furrows in your forehead,
Like the lemurs bear as a mark!

HECATE:
I want nothing more than to carry out the command
Given to me by the great goddess.
But listen, god of the dead, now hear
What the voice of a living man says.

TRIPTOLEMUS:
Stop, Persephone, do not drink
From this ominous cup!
Remember your mother's warning.

PERSEPHONE confused and as if awakening from a bad dream:
Who are you, young man, mortal though you are,
Yet bold and courageous like the gods?

TRIPTOLEMUS:
The son of the king of Eleusis,
Protected by Demeter, the great goddess,
I should have placed the crown upon my head.
To free you from terrible bonds,
I have despised what seemed certain to me.

PERSEPHONE:
O young and fearless ephebe!
Your sight snatches me from my dream,
Which rose horribly from my soul;
You bring back to me the springtime earth
With my mother and Uranus,
And the husband I had forgotten
In this world full of night and terror.
Like a spring that begins to sprout anew
After long having dried up,
So heavenly voices murmur in my heart.

TRIPTOLEMUS:
Then climb into the chariot and follow me.

PERSEPHONE:
To break open the gates of this realm for me
Is not permitted to you! To snatch me away
Only a god can do that to a god.
Only he who
Was already united with me in my mother's womb!
The Titans have torn my beloved from me!
He is always alive in my thoughts, which
Zeus keeps hidden in his soul.
Only he can save me.
I call upon you, Dionysus, Dionysus!
She throws Pluto's cup to the ground.

PLUTO:
I sentence Triptolemus to death!
He is forever bound to hell.

Another clap of thunder. Pluto, Persephone, Hecate, and Triptolemus disappear.