Lessons from the Anatomy & Dissection of a Pomegranate

Lessons from Seeding a Pomegranate

As the harvest season wilts into Scorpio, we are faced with the juxtaposition of celebrating the fruits of our labor with the the slow creeping in of inevitable death.

Moving to rural Washington has connected me with nature in ways I never knew I was missing. My drives back and forth to school have so far been bursting with beauty and bounty. I watched as each apple orchard and hop field was harvested one by one. Their juicy harvest bouncing and brimming with nourishment in the backs of giant trucks, hoisted away to feed so many hungry people. I watched the pregnant mare’s belly swell and then one day her precious cargo just stood grazing alongside her with awkward legs and eager eyes. The steer lowing and swinging their tails as their bellies fatten, unknowingly nearing the fate of their slaughter.

This past drive I noticed the fields start to wither and brown, whispering of the frigid cold that creeps in as the scythe of death draws near. The scenery will only become more barren from here.

As I cut open this pomegranate, I was reminded of the mythos of Persephone, Queen of the Underworld. I thought about how, just like the queen herself, nobody goes to the Underworld willingly. In the hero’s journey, we are all dragged down into the darkness with baited breath and hackled hair at the back of our necks. The unknown that death brings is absolutely terrifying, our worst fears don the armor of darkness and we are left shivering and sniveling, alone.

As I began to rip this sanguine fruit apart, I stare with wonder at all the deep crevices lined with blood-red seeds. The more I dig into its flesh, the more seeds are revealed. Each one a tiny burst holding the entire potential energy of another whole-grown pomegranate. Seeding a pomegranate is no simple task. It’s not a “cut up into fourths and you’re done” kind of thing. It’s an investment. The juices squirt every which way and my fingers begin to stain. It reminds me of the messiness of life, the messiness of death.

We do not go into the darkness willingly, no… That is simply not our nature. But I begin to realize that as I rip open the flesh of this pomegranate and as its corpse lies open and vulnerable in front of me, willingly yielding its precious nutrients, I think about how through steady faith I can crack open my own soul and follow suit. Walk the halls of my darkness, lined with seeds, and find potential within. How the very essence of death gives way to new life after careful, intentional putrefaction. The scorpion of Scorpio teaches us to overcome our own programming and succumb to the inevitability of death, embrace the violence.

What will I lay to rest about myself this year? The one that says “there’s no time to take care of yourself,” the one that says “you aren’t good enough,” the one that says “it’s you against the world,” the one that says “you’re all alone.” These voices have helped me in the past. They taught me how to be self-sufficient, they taught me how to get shit done without excuses, they taught me how to be a hard, independent worker. They taught me to be resilient despite all odds, and those are lessons I will always carry with me. But their words have stung like a scorpion and served their purpose and like the snake of Scorpio, it is time to shed my skin. As the fecundity of these seeds begins to percolate within my own flesh, I reach to the sky for the Eagle.

I thank these old versions of myself and then I exfoliate them from my soul like dead skin—with utmost confidence that there will be more fresh epithelial cells below that keratinized surface. More voices, more lessons, more whispers of life after death… a bird’s eye view of the cycle of life.

As the days wane in their length, I ground more deeply into the hearth of myself. I do not shudder as the bitter cold claws at my flesh, for I have within me an invincible summer. I honor this exhalation in this long procession of the breath of my life. Because in the end, with every breath and every heartbeat, I am more and more reassured of one fact, and one fact only: “I AM”