According to Greek mythology, Persephone was a young goddess who was captured by the god Hades and forced to live in the depths of the underworld with him. Persephone’s father, Zeus, had secretly negotiated with Hades to take her. Her mother, Demeter, Goddess of agriculture, upon learning of this, lobbied for Persephone to come back to live and thrive in the sun again. Hades finally relented with an agreement to allow her to emerge in the spring, but tricked her into eating pomegranate seeds. She, eating only six before realizing their significance, was thus allowed to be on earth for six months - the six months of spring and summer, coming up out of forced obscurity to bring the bounty of spring with her.
Persephone Ascending is partly a celebration of the myth of the onset of spring, but it is also a modern fable about women newly emerging into positions of power and effect previously protected for themselves by men.