Pomegranate of a Dead Girl

This is the story of a girl who let cruelty dictate her fate for far too long,
A girl who believed their words over what was inside of her own heart,
A girl who decided to shed what no longer belonged to her.

The meadows were bursting with flowers, a clear sign of the spring that is to come. Persephone and her maidens would spend hours basking in the glory of the sun and chasing each other gleefully through the fields. She was young, she was adored, and she was worshipped. She was innocent by nature, naïve about the world, a little too trusting perhaps. Enchanted by the wonderous bloom of the narcissus, she strayed a bit too far from her companions, from her mother Demeter and her ever watchful eye. For when the dark lord of the underworld espied her beauty, he was entranced, captivated even. He had to have her all to himself.

In his chariot drawn by coal-black steeds, he rose up through a chasm in the earth. He grabbed her by the wrist and set her beside him. He bore her back down to the center of the earth, weeping for her mother, her friends, her blissful life of blue skies and puffy clouds. Demeter, having heard her cries of longing, despaired at her disappearance. Nine days she wandered, searching for her lost daughter, never allowing spring’s sweet nectar to touch her lips.

That year was the worst for humankind, as in her grief she refused to let any seed spring up. Nothing grew. The oxen plowed empty fields in vain. It seemed the whole race of man would die of starvation, of famine. At last Zeus knew that he had to do something, anything to save the earthly creatures from their inevitable demise. His brother Hades, having taken Persephone as his wife, was going to have to return her to Demeter, the goddess of the corn.

Persephone longed for her old life, the one she knew before she sank into the underworld. Hades prayed that she would think kindly of him, begged her to not to be so sorrowful, as she was the bride who was great among immortals. He fed her pomegranate seeds, knowing in his heart that in doing so she must return to him one day. Zeus freed her from her throne, but conceded that because she had tasted the fruits of Hades, she must descend back into the world of the dead for four months out of every year. Demeter, having her daughter back at least partially, made the fields rich again. The whole world became abundant, bright with the fruit and flowers that give us such a life.

For the Love of Dance

For as long as I can remember I have always loved to dance. It started out with ballet and tap at the age of three, followed by jazz and pointe in my preteen years. I spent more hours in that studio than anywhere else. My friends were there. My joy was there. It was everything to me for eleven straight years. When I was fifteen I took myself off the stage.

During one of my performances I made a mistake and missed my mark. I looked into the eyes of my co-performer, holding back tears, pleadingly them to help me, to do something to trigger my brain to tell me what I was supposed to do next. My mind went completely blank and I on the inside I panicked. I remember trying so hard to keep it together, to not let the audience know that I fucked up, to try to make it through this portion of the show, to not do what my brain was telling me to do which was run off the stage.

When I finally did get off the stage, I kept quiet and I kept my head down until the show was over not saying anything to anyone. I packed up all my things and I went home. I felt like an utter failure, like I had let everyone down, including myself. I cried myself to sleep that Friday night and then I stayed home all weekend, too scared to face anyone, ashamed at all that had happened.

That next Monday in class when I walked in the room, my instructor loudly exclaimed in front of the whole class that I sucked. Her words, not mine. I could feel the tears welling in my eyes when I heard those words come out of her mouth, my lip beginning to quiver. I wanted to cry. I had let everyone down because I wasn’t good enough. That was my last performance for 25 years.

On a whim in December 2023 I decided to sign up for an introductory pole dancing course, and by the end of the month I knew I needed to dance again. I liked this especially because it was the furthest away from that classical training I had before, and I could feel that hole in my heart beginning to refill again. My love of dance was coming back, and with that I was learning so much more about myself and what I am capable of.

I kept at it for a year, sharing my journey on these pages, exploring myself deeper. I learned how to climb. I learned how to fall. I conquered my fear of being upside down. Okay that part is still a work in progress. I found new friends. I found community. I found all the things I had before with ballet, except this time it was vastly different.

Finding Courage

People often ask me how I find the confidence to do all that I do, and I don’t really have an answer to that question. I don’t feel confident most of the time. What I am is courageous. I don’t mind falling down. At this point I have picked myself back up more times than I can remember. I don’t mind trying new things. See the pile of unfinished hobbies that I swear to all that is holy I will get back to some day.

On another whim (Are you seeing a pattern yet?) I signed up for a Burlesque Kittening 101 class that an old industry friend was teaching. I had been to see a couple burlesque performances locally before and was interested to see what it was all about, if it was something else that I might want to pursue. While I found burlesque to be fascinating in its own right, it wasn’t exactly what I was looking for. It seemed too big, too grand, and I wasn’t ready to be put on that kind of stage. I sat with that, and pondered over what that meant for me. I realized very quickly that I was still terrified of performing in front of an audience, and that I wanted to do just that.

Every December the pole studio that I practice in puts on a Showcase, and with this desire to put this fear behind me I signed up to be one of the twelve performers. This is my story.

The Underworld

We hear the story of Persephone and read it as this sad, awful story about kidnapping and rape. When you look further into her history, you will come to find that “She Who Destroys the Light” was the Queen of the Underworld long before there was ever a mention of Pluto or Hades. In fact it didn’t come until thousands of years later.

Until you make the unconscious, conscious, it will rule your life and you will call it Fate. – Jung

In modern astrology Pluto represents our unconscious desires. It was discovered in 1930 around the same time that us humans were learning about existentialism, the idea that you determine the course of your own life instead of relying on some predetermined trajectory. This concept involves taking responsibility for the decisions that we have made that got us here. We chose to hide parts of ourselves, to shove them down into the recesses of our souls. This also means that we are the ones who need to dive into that shadow realm and to shine some light into those corners.

The more time Persephone spent with her Hades, the more she craved this darker side of her nature. She relished in it even. With pomegranate juice running down her fingers, her stomach, her thighs, she felt more alive in this dark dismal world than she ever imagined. She felt a sense of freedom, of liberation from her mother’s protective gaze. She finally felt like she was herself. She finally felt like she was home.

Deathless Desire

What is desire? Is it a wanting? A need? An admittance? A release? The dictionary says it’s a longing or a craving. I like to think of it more as a connection, as both a teacher and a portal to the true self. We all live in this duality: the angel v the demon, good v bad, right v wrong. We spend years pulling ourselves apart only to spend many more years trying to put ourselves back together again. Why do we do this to ourselves? Fear. Shame. A little bit of both.

Shame is the intensely painful feeling or experience of believing that we are flawed and therefore unworthy of love, belonging, and connection. – Brené Brown

The antidote to shame is empathy, and (un)fortunately that means brings our shame points out into the open. Shame wants us to feel alone, while empathy says there is common humanity here. And that idea is fucking scary!

We all have that thing (or multiple things) that we secretly desire and that we simultaneously judge ourselves harshly for even thinking about wanting it. The French psychoanalyst and psychiatrist Jacques Lecan coined the term jouissance, which is a pleasure so intense that we repress it. The story about Peter Pan illustrates this beautifully.

As he escapes out the window of the Darling house Nana, the family dog, snaps at him and his shadow is cut off and left inside. He goes back to find it, searching in the dog house and the toy chest, all while Tinkerbell gets caught up in how she looks and the size of her hips. She then notices a keyed drawer that it bursting at the seams, the shadow trying to escape its cage. He chases it around the room, eventually capturing that other side of him, and waking Wendy in the process. He admits that he was there to hear her stories, ones of himself and his adventures, while she sews his shadow back to his feet.

The Seed of Something New

The story of Persephone is one that speaks to me on a personal level. It’s why I chose this theme for my dance. I tried so hard to be that sweet girl picking flowers in the meadow, the one that garnered approval from polite society. And she is a part of me. There is also a taboo side that has been begging to be experienced, to be felt, to be seen. She is a part of me too, and I need her.

I wanted the beginning of my dance (and my story) to be a nod to that little girl inside of me, the ballerina that wanted so much to just be loved and accepted. I incorporated aspects of my classical ballet training into the beginning of the dance, when the music was more tender and caring. A grande plié led to an arabesque which led to a series of pirouettes, symbolizing a maiden’s dance around the maypole. I incorporated the Ballerina, a pole move that reminded me of the music box I once had as a child.

It was only after I melted into the ground, a longing for something more, that I saw the crown laying delicately on a black cloth. I laid down beside it and as the music shifted to something moodier something snapped inside of me. I spent the next few moments stripping myself down of all the pretty. I unlaced the shoes and threw them across the room before climbing up the pole, a symbolic attempt to escape from the Underworld. I removed the ballet skirt and let it fall gracefully back down, and I followed it in a series of moves meant to illustrate my descent back into that dark side of myself, the one that will ultimately free me from that shackles that I put on myself to hold me back.

In my final act I pulled off the tiara and ribbons, tossing them away, and I took the crown and placed it on my own head. I crowned myself Persephone, Queen of the Underworld.

From Concept to Finished Piece

From day one I knew I wanted my dance to be about Persephone tasting the pomegranate from the Underworld and finding her place as its Queen. It feels accurate to the story of my life, one of separation and also one of conjoining. I wanted to dive into this fear of performing, the fear of fucking it all up again, and to take this space back for myself. And much like pulling shame out of the darkness, I had to do it with people that I trusted could hold that empathy and compassion for me while I worked through it. The literal only place I felt I could be vulnerable enough was in the pole studio that I have grown so fond of, a community of shes and theys that are struggling with these same types of thoughts and emotions.

It was still fucking hard, and the path was more assuredly not linear in nature. There were days when I laughed. There were days when I cried. There were days when I wanted to give up. And there were days when I pushed myself to keep going, to go even deeper. I had to fight with this idea of getting it all perfect, of not missing the mark like I did all those years ago. I had to sit with the fact that it very well might happen, that I might fall on my face. And you know what? It did happen, and dare I say, it turned out better that way.

I had initially planned to take off the skirt on the ground before that final climb. Halfway up the pole I realized that I had forgotten, so I stopped and ripped off the skirt then and there. The audience cheered and threw down money, while I kept fucking going. After the first performance, the other dancers (having watched me practice this dance numerous times over this three-month period) told me that moving that part of the dance was even better than what they had seen before. My fuck-up caused a rounding applause. My failure ended up being a roaring success.

Mad love, Jenna

song: Pomegranate of a Dead Girl by Gloombug