Rita Dove in the poem The Bistro Styx uses Greek mythology of Demeter and Persephone in order to depict the troubled relationship between mother and daughter. To mix-up both myth and the context of the poem, the poem is about modern Demeter (the mother) who in her search discovers modern Persephone (the daughter) in the underworld of modern Paris abducted by the Hades of modern civilization.

       The daughter works as a model for an artist who runs a studio that features the futuristic paintings. The daughter tries to prove the significance of her life in city taking the reference of the love of tourist and Parisians. This reference becomes ironical because of the transitoriness of love of tourist and Parisian.
      The central theme of the poetry is the act of eating and drinking at the restaurant. The daughter likes drinking and eating than the conversation with the mother. The way she is centered on drinking and eating gives the reader a clue that modern Persephone is not going to be fully restored (saved). According to ancient Greek myth, it was eating of few seeds of pomegranate that was a reason behind Persephone failure to restore herself completely in the world of living beings. Eating the seeds of pomegranate, Persephone becomes half living and half dead.
      Similarly, in the poem the different varieties of dishes, that the daughter orders can be compared to seeds of pomegranate. Therefore, this modern Persephone will forever be in the underworld with the Hades. Perhaps, because of this the mother realizes that she has lost the daughter forever at the end of the poem.
Another mythical allusion in the poem is of the river of forgetfulness; Styx. According to the myth, if the dead drinks water from Styx while crossing the boundary between the world of living being and the world of dead, it forgets everything about its previous life. The daughter’s drinking of wine resembles the dead drinking water form Styx. The daughter has forgotten her relation, life in village, tradition and rural values.
      The pain of mother is losing her child in the chaotic world even if she wants to bring back her to home (earlier state) but she can’t do so as it has become too late. She (her daughter) has completely ruined and has eaten seed of pomegranate; means to say belongs to dead one and has drunk water from Styx that implies she has forgotten her mom and earlier life. On the other hand daughter’s view is that in the name of career, job, opportunity, modernity, fashion, she has to sacrifice her old attitude, old values, and tradition. Even she wants to stay with mom, she can’t because she needs to compete in this modern world to sustain and keep her standards up-to-date. She is seduced by modern facilities and opportunities.
      In mythical background this poetry explores postmodern society. This type of reality is also known as Mythopoeic reality. Modern daughters are not being abducted by Hades but in the name of career, job, personality they are abducted themselves. The ancient Persephone was always urging to go back to her mother but this modern Persephone has willingly chosen to be the victim of the modern Hades.

The Bistro Styx - Poem by Rita Dove

She was thinner, with a mannered gauntness
as she paused just inside the double
glass doors to survey the room, silvery cape
billowing dramatically behind her. What’s this,

I thought, lifting a hand until
she nodded and started across the parquet;
that’s when I saw she was dressed all in gray,
from a kittenish cashmere skirt and cowl

down to the graphite signature of her shoes.
“Sorry I’m late,” she panted, though
she wasn’t, sliding into the chair, her cape

tossed off in a shudder of brushed steel.
We kissed. Then I leaned back to peruse
my blighted child, this wary aristocratic mole.
“How’s business?” I asked, and hazarded
a motherly smile to keep from crying out:
Are you content to conduct your life
as a cliché and , what’s worse,
an anachronism, the brooding artist’s demimonde?
Near the rue Princesse they had opened
a gallery cum souvenir shop which featured
fuzzy off-color Monets next to his acrylics, no doubt,
plus bearded African drums and the occasional miniature
gargoyle from Notre Dame the Great Artist had
carved at breakfast with a pocket knife.

“Tourists love us. The Parisians, of course” -
she blushed - “are amused, though not without
a certain admiration …”
The Chateaubriand

arrived on a bone –white plate, smug and absolute
in its fragrant crust, a black plug steaming
like the heart plucked from the chest of a worthy enemy;
one touch with her fork sent pike juices streaming.

“Admiration for what?” Wine, a bloody
Pinot Noir, brought color to her cheeks. “Why,
the aplomb with which we’ve managed
to support our Art” – meaning he’d convinced

her to pose nude for his appalling canvases,
faintly futuristic landscape strewn
with carwrecks and bodies being chewed

by rabid cocker spaniels. “I’d like to come by
the studio,” I ventured, “and see the new stuff.”
“Yes, if you wish … “A delicate rebuff

before the warning: “He dresses all
in black now. Me, he drapes in blues and carmine –
and even though I think it’s kinda cute,
in company I tend toward more muted shades.”

She paused and had the grace
to drop her eyes. She did look ravishing.
spookily insubstantial, a lipstick ghost on tissue,
or as if one stood on a fifth-floor terrace

peering through a fringe of rain at Paris’
dreaming chimney pots, each sooty issue
wobbling skyward in an ecstatic oracular spiral.

“And he never thinks of food. I wish
I didn’t have to plead with him to eat …” Fruit
and cheese appeared, arrayed on leaf-green dishes.

I stuck with café crème. “This Camembert’s
so ripe,” she joked, “it’s practically grown hair,”
mucking a golden glob complete with parsley sprig
onto a heel of bread. Nothing seemed to fill

her up; She swallowed, sliced into a pear,
speared each tear-shaped lavaliere
and popped the dripping mess into her pretty mouth.
Nowhere the bright tufted fields, weighted

vines and sun poured down out of the south.
“But are you happy?” Fearing, I whispered it
quickly. “What? You know, Mother” –

she bit into the starry rose of a fig –
“one really should try the fruit here.”
I’ve lost her, I thought, and called for the bill.