Pomona- Roman GodDeity"Goddess of Fruit Trees"

The Pruning Knife

Pomona cared nothing for forests or streams or hunting. Her world was the orchard: the pruned branch, the grafted scion, the tree trained to bear. Her tool was the falx, the curved pruning knife, and Ovid says she carried it everywhere. She had no Greek equivalent. Her name comes from pomum, fruit, and the Romans gave her a priest of her own, the Flamen Pomonalis, and a sacred grove called the Pomonal twelve miles from Rome on the road to Ostia.

She kept her gardens locked. Pan came calling and she refused him. Silvanus tried. She refused him too.

Vertumnus

Vertumnus, god of seasons and change, was in love with Pomona, and Ovid tells the story at length in the Metamorphoses. He could take any shape, and he used this gift recklessly. He came to her orchard as a reaper carrying grain. She ignored him. He came as a vine-dresser with a pruning hook. She ignored him again. He wore every face he could think of, and none of them worked.

Finally he came as an old woman. He entered the garden, admired the fruit, and kissed Pomona. The kiss lingered longer than an old woman's should. He sat beside her and pointed to an elm tree with a vine growing up its trunk: see how the vine and tree support each other? Alone, the vine would crawl on the ground. Alone, the tree would bear no grapes. Then he told her the story of Iphis, a young man who loved the cold Anaxarete. She scorned him until he hanged himself on her doorpost. When Anaxarete watched his funeral procession pass below her window without pity, Venus turned her to stone where she stood.

The old woman's voice changed. Vertumnus dropped the disguise and stood before Pomona as he was: young, bright as the sun breaking through cloud. Pomona looked at him. She did not refuse.