Fairest of my Muses

I had all of it laid out: my Phrygian cap, the Golden Fleece, the epic poetry tablets of Calliope, the sacred laurels of Apollo, fragrant incense, milk, and honey. Desperately, I chanted her name over and over, my words lost to the rustle of leaves. Everything I had, and everything they ever required, lay before me on the grass as my full offering.

But she wouldn’t show up. Nobody had truly done it before, yes. But nobody who’s ever tried has ever been her son. Surely, she wouldn’t turn me down. Minutes passed, and I grew restless. Would a song or an epic poem summon her? I was ready with several at once, yearning and pleading.

The forests whispered calmly in the springtime breeze. My broken hummings must have reached her—or one of her sisters—for I heard a soft chuckle gently stir the air at last. Feverish, I looked into the ritual and sought the immortal face of a spirit or a goddess; whoever had condescended to answer my wretched callings.

“You don’t need these to summon the Muses,” the female voice shimmered with warm amusement. “You must have forgotten: you’re their favorite. All you need to do is sing.”

“Mother,” I breathed out, laying my eyes on the tall woman standing in the middle of the circle of attributes I’d laid. The muse of epic poetry wore a white robe with a golden belt to fasten it. “My heart is glad to see you.”

“What is it, my child?” Calliope said, features changing with the shadow of worry. “You look troubled.”

“I need to speak to my father,” I said.

“You know he’s busy.”

“Yes, but Eurydice—fell into a nest of vipers and was bitten. I must get her back.” 

There was a pregnant pause, and my mother looked at me with a furrow of dreadful sympathy. “My son, if she was bitten, then she is lost to the mortal world.”

“No,” I snapped at her so ferociously she flinched. “I will wait here until you get my father.” 

“Apollo only weaves melodies and verses that can soothe a soul, not restore it,” Calliope warned. “If the scythe of Thanatos has already severed Eurydice’s soul from her body, you cannot retrieve it.” 

“I do not need his powers or gifts. What I require of him is simply to speak to Lord Hades.” I paused. “Or to Lady Persephone, his beloved. Mercy and compassion are not foreign to her.” 

“No one returns from the Underworld, Orpheus. There are rules, and Hades will not break them for you.”

I slowly lowered to my knees, leaning my palms against the luscious tufts of grass, short of breath, suffocated with grief. “I don’t care for rules, be it godly or mortal.” 

In my periphery, Calliope stepped outside the circle and placed a hand on my head. “Do not go against the gods, my boy. You will not win.” Her fingers caressed my hair lovingly. “Let your heart grieve, but do not cross the borders of Hades’ realm. I am telling you this out of love, to preserve you.”

I remained quiet. 

Her hand withdrew. “I’m sorry, Orpheus, that I must leave you now. I will let your father know of your request, but do not hope he’ll help you in this matter.” 

And then her presence dissipated to the wind. 

The silence shattered my heart into pieces, and my chest convulsed and gave in under the crushing sorrow, a low wailing sound wresting out of me at the sharp pain of it. Hands groping into the circle that I had so diligently ordered, I grasped my lyre and stumbled my way back down the road. It meandered through the nameless paths of the Olympic forest and into a sunlit meadow.

Angry tears blurred my vision, but I trudged to the grove where I last left Eurydice in the dappled shadow beneath a wild olive tree. There I found her fragile body rigid and motionless once more, relaxed against a bed of lilac-streaked white gagea flowers. Pain shot through me again at the sight of her, once so abundant with life and now mute and still, and void of color, like the rocks on a riverbed. 

“Oh, my Eurydice, I miss you so,” I wept over her bosom as if my tears would somehow infuse breath into her lungs. I held her icy hand and squeezed. “No song of mine shall be the same without your dancing to it over morning dew.”

Exhausted, I sat by her on the grass and sighed with heavy sorrow. Tentatively, I pulled my lyre close and tried to revive any of her favorite verses and chords in my memory. There was joy in all of them, but joy I had none left. 

Shakily, I fondled the strings and a bittersweet chord resounded in the open. I shouldn’t have doubted… the thought trailed off as I strung another chord, blinking up to see a family of warblers alight on the branches above me, chirping among each other.

 “I shouldn’t have doubted,” I sang, my voice hoarse with tears, my fingers flittering through the strings with two new chords, slow and descending, “that time by your side was Elysian.” 

A pair of brown squirrels appeared at the nearest tree, and then a fox too, with pelts white and auburn-red. “Feasting on blissful ambrosia, tasting the fruits of the gods.” Warmth streamed down my cheeks anew when I laid eyes on the peaceful Eurydice beside me, her beauty even more striking in her deathly slumber.

Some larger beast approached me from across the meadow, careful, curious, threading quietly as if not to disturb the resonance of my woeful melody. 

“Now that you’re gone, every second is wrapped in unbearable anguish,” my voice faltered, and still I counted my long and short syllables, “iron-clad lashes of Furies that tear at the wound in my soul.”

 I played and played, in hopes the music would lift the sorrow off my chest, but it never did. At least the forest creatures came to me in soundless solidarity, enough to not let me drown in my vast loneliness.

*

I hadn’t sensed when night had fallen and a glittering light in the middle of the meadow interrupted my hour-long song. A female shape appeared to me—fair, young, and tender—with vibrant blossoms in her luscious hair, yet her eyes had swollen and were pinkish, no doubt to the effect of tears recently dried.

“All the gods and mortals,” she began, in a dulcet voice, “all the nymphs and deities have found unity, for once, in mourning with you, Orpheus. They've paused to listen to your grievous voice."

The statement embittered me. “That I have won the favor of the gods does not remedy my wound. My only joy, my Eurydice, is gone.” 

 “Yes,” Persephone whispered, “Thus My Lord Hades will allow you passage through the depths, for even he was moved to tears by your love, so great and so profound.”

I jumped to my feet at her words—words like the finest balm to my ears—breath stuck in my throat as I felt tears of joy now gather at the corners of my eyes. Then I returned to Eurydice’s frigid body and spoke over her, “Hold on, fairest of my muses and rhythm of my heart, I am going to retrieve you and we shall be together once more.”

“Hades has but one condition,” Persephone said quietly, “which he will share with you himself.” 

“I will do anything,” I assured her readily, leaving Eurydice’s side to approach the spring goddess again, brimming with hope.

Nothing sacred or profane, no creature nightmarish or divine, could resist the sweet enchantment of my music. Not even the fearsome Cerberus could stop me when I had all the Muses on my side.

“Very well,” she nodded respectfully, and I followed her into the Underworld.