The youngest daughter of a noble king, I was admired throughout the land for my flawless grace and charm. Everyone said my appearance rivaled that of a goddess, and gradually the simple people in my father's city spent more time worshipping me than Aphrodite, the real goddess of Beauty. I was modest by nature and resisted the inappropriate attention, but the damage had already been done. Aphrodite noticed her popularity dwindle at the expense of a mere mortal and immediately planned my punishment.

Aphrodite commanded her son, Cupid, to wound me with one of his arrows. Cupid, the god of Desire, was to avenge his mother by making me fall in love with the meanest, ugliest man he could find. Cupid left at once and flew to my father's palace, sneaking in through my open window as I slept. Some say he accidentally pricked himself with one of his arrows as he kneeled beside my bed, which helped explain how a god could have affection for a mortal. In truth, Cupid was stricken by my beauty, and it was literally love at first sight.

This sudden wave of passion both confused and pained Cupid. He left my room and flew to see Apollo, the god of Truth and Light, where they quietly talked for a long time. The suitors who requested my hand in marriage began disappearing over the following weeks; my father feared that the gods were angry with him, and he also went to see Apollo for advice.

"Perhaps it has been decreed that your daughter is to marry a god," Apollo said, keeping Cupid's confession a secret. "Leave her alone on top of a mountain and you will find out if a god indeed wants her for a wife." My father returned home and reported what Apollo had told him. Grief consumed the palace and city as they realized my certain doom. Commands of the gods must always be obeyed, and the streets glowed with torches as everyone prepared to escort me to my place of exile.

A single flute led chanted funeral hymns as I was solemnly paraded up the steep mountain. The tearful crowd said goodbye when we had reached the top of the summit, and I watched their torches grow smaller and smaller after they left me to my fate. I was suddenly overcome by loneliness and cried myself to sleep on the barren peak. While I slept, the gentle West Wind collected me up in her arms and carried me to a plateau filled with flowers.

When I woke in the thick grass, I was amazed to find myself in front of a majestic palace with gold columns and an ivory roof. Faint voices whispered that everything I saw was now mine, so I swam in a nearby spring then ate a delicious meal mysteriously placed on the bank while I had bathed. After I went to bed that night, I felt the presence of someone else in the room. I called out in the dark, and a voice answered.

"I love you more than you could ever know, and would be honored if you will be my wife." Cupid walked to my bed and sat next to me. "But I must ask that you never try to look at my face. I will only visit you in the darkness of night, but these nights will be glorious and filled with joy." I asked him why I could not look at him, even though his soothing voice filled me with more emotion than all of my former suitors put together. Cupid sighed and said, "Honor my request, for if you look upon me, we will be separated forever."

Cupid felt that if I found out he was the son of Aphrodite, I would love him more for being a god than as an equal. I truly did enjoy the nights with him but was terribly bored and lonely during the day. I asked Cupid if my sisters could visit me, but Cupid warned that it would certainly bring an end to our happiness. I persisted, however, and he grew sad seeing me suffer. Cupid asked the West Wind to deliver my sisters to me early one morning, and they arrived later that day.

My two sisters were glad to find me alive and well, but they soon became envious of my spectacular palace and the beautiful countryside. When they demanded to see my husband I told them that Cupid would not allow himself to be seen in the daylight, and that even I had no knowledge of his appearance . "He must be ugly then," they said.

I told them that he was kind and loved me more than life itself, so it was unimportant what he looked like. Their husbands were cold and uncaring, which made my sisters even more jealous. During their next visit, they said they believed my husband wasn't so wonderful at all. "We visited an oracle who told us your husband is a deformed and horrible monster," they said, "and that is why he won't let you see him."

I screamed at them that it wasn't true, but they assured me it was. "And worse still," they said, "the oracle said he waits only for you to bear him a child and then plans to kill you!" My sisters convinced me to light a candle that night and hold it to his face after Cupid fell into a deep slumber. I was shocked to find Aphrodite's son laying there, his perfect features making even the candle burn more brightly. My heart raced as I found my love for him swell even greater inside me, and in that moment of emotion, a drop of wax fell from the candle and landed on Cupid's shoulder.

Cupid woke, and when he saw me standing over him holding the lamp, his eyes lowered in sadness. "So you thought I was grotesque and hideous," he mumbled. Before I could answer him, he quietly said, "There can be no love if there is not trust. I will never come to see you again." He walked to the window and prepared to fly away. I leaped after him and held his legs as he rose, but my strength left me and I fell to the ground. I wished the pain that consumed my body would soon bring death.

When I recovered I sought help from many gods and goddesses, but none of them dared face the wrath of Aphrodite. Demeter, the god of Grain, finally gave me some advice. He told me that Cupid was filled with sorrow as well, and that Aphrodite grew tired of caring for him while he sulked in his bed at her palace. "Go and seek forgiveness from Aphrodite, and beg her to unite the two of you once more."

Aphrodite shrieked when she saw me at her door and ordered her handmaidens Trouble and Sorrow to tear my clothes and pull at my hair. When they had finished, Aphrodite gave me a task to complete before I could see Cupid. She led me to a store-house filled with many kinds of grain. Sort all these by evening, she said, then disappeared. I stared hopelessly at the pile of barley, lentils, and poppy seeds.

There was a rope on a shelf, and I resigned to hang myself and be rid of my anguish. As I finished tying the noose, an army of ants marched out from a crack in the floor. They balanced a single grain on each of their backs and made three separate piles while more ants followed behind from the crack. When Aphrodite returned that night she screamed, "Someone must have helped you! You must do another task in the morning!" I was hungry, but finally fell asleep on the floor.

The next morning Aphrodite led me to a high hill. "Go to the pasture beside the flowing stream," the goddess said. "Fierce rams with golden wool live there. You must gather some of their fleece, then maybe you'll be worthy of my son's love." I stood by the flowing stream that bordered the pasture and watched the beasts fight with one another. I knew I could never get near their wool without being killed.

I accepted my certain doom and decided to drown myself in the stream. As I waded out, the reeds whistled in the breeze and began speaking to me. "You need not approach those terrible sheep," they whispered. "In the midday heat, when the sheep are napping, slip into the pasture and pick the golden wool caught on the briars and thorn bushes. When the drowsy rams settled down to sleep, I crossed the stream and crept into the pasture. I gathered an armful of wool from the sharp bushes then quietly snuck away.

When Aphrodite saw the wool in my arms, she smiled bitterly. "Someone is helping you," she said, "but they can't help you on this next task". She told me to fill a crystal goblet with icy mountain water from the mouth of the Stygian River. I could tell by Aphrodite's expression that I would never be able to get the water, but began climbing the steep mountain ridge anyway. When I reached the top and looked at the river in the valley, I began crying in desperation.

The rocks leading down to the mouth of the river were hopelessly steep and wet from the current's spray. I decided to jump off the cliff and end my suffering. "Wait!" I looked up and saw an eagle soaring toward me. "Give me the cup and I will fly to the river's mouth and get the water for you." I held the crystal goblet above my head and the eagle swooped down and took it. The great bird held the vessel tightly with its talons as it glided to the gurgling river. It returned and gently released the goblet of dark water into my outstretched hands, and I made my way back down the mountain.

When I handed the crystal goblet to Aphrodite, the goddess accused me of being a sorceress. She said she had one last task for me that couldn't be completed with the help of magic: she ordered me to carry a box to the Underworld and ask Queen Prosperina for a small portion of her beauty. I knew this was surely the end for me. I could never gain the courage needed to enter the Underworld, the terrifying land of the dead. Filled with despair, I climbed to the top of the palace's tower and prepared to hurl myself off.

Just as I leaned forward, a low voice came from a corner of the tower's small room. I looked and saw nothing but a small stone near the wall. I again heard the voice, and stepped toward it. "Are you such a coward that you will give up now, after so many impossible trials?" The stone paused, then added, "Collect your self-respect, then I will tell you how to reach the Underworld and complete your quest." I stood up straight and took a deep breath.

"Take two coins and two pieces of barley cake", the stone said. "Give one coin to Charon, the ferryman, and he will take you across the river Styx to the Underworld. As you cross the water, the groping hand of a dying man will reach out to you, but you must turn away. You must also refuse to help three women weaving the threads of Fate, and any others seeking aid. When you come to Cerberus, the three-headed watchdog that guards the palace doors, give him a barley cake and he will be friendly to you. Do all of this again on your way out. But listen closely: when you carry the box of beauty back from Prosperina, do not open it." As I turned to leave, the stone repeated, "Whatever you do, do not open the box!"

I did exactly as the stone suggested. I passed a coin to Charon, gave Cerberus a barley cake, and refused to help the wailing lost souls along the way. I crouched at Prosperina's feet and humbly requested some of her beauty, which she slid in under my box's lid. Then I did everything again, exactly as before, before eventually leaving the dead forest to follow the road back to Aphrodite's palace. A burning desire to look inside the box suddenly overcame me. I crouched and slowly lifted the box's lid.

The box appeared empty, but something strange and invisible entered my body through my nose. A deadly sleep struck me down, punishment for my curiosity. I collapsed on the road and felt the sleep consume me.

Back at Aphrodite's palace, Cupid clutched his chest as he was jolted awake from his somber sleep. He sprang from his bed of pity and flew high above the earth. He frantically scanned the ground and soon spotted me in the road. Cupid held me in his arms and slowly gathered the sleep from my body. Then he woke me with a short but passionate kiss.

Aphrodite chased us, but Cupid held me tight and flew as fast as he could. We reached the heavens and landed on Mount Olympus before she could catch us. Cupid pleaded with Zeus, god of the Sky, who shook his head and smiled before agreeing to marry us. Everyone celebrated our marriage, even Aphrodite after a while, and a year later Cupid and I had a child. We named her Pleasure.

Again and again, I had surrendered to the obstacles that separated us, deciding it would be easier to give up than try at all; but each time there were unexplainable forces helping me along, breaking all rules of logic for the sake of an emotion that, by nature, is equally as mysterious and powerful.

I betrayed Cupid's trust by shedding light on his face; yet, despite his disappointment, he could not deny his heart's desire, and by forgiving me set free his own burden of despair.

And Cupid, though his intentions were good, feared our differences would tear us apart; but though love may be blind, it need not be a secret hidden from those who may disapprove, nor should it share time and space with Doubt while Truth draws nearer each second.

The gods were so touched by the passion Cupid and I had for one another that they granted me immortality. We lived happily ever after...and still do.

My name is Psyche, and some say that I represent the struggles of the human spirit. But where I'm from, we just call that love.

Happy Valentine's Day!