But the wild pomegranate did not exist in the Aegean in Neolithic times - it came from eastern Persia. In Greek mythology, Persephone was kidnapped by Hades and taken to the underworld to be his wife.

The pomegranate can grow from a 3-foot dwarf shrub to a 30-foot tree. Although it is mostly deciduous, it may be evergreen in warmer areas. Its glossy foliage and tube-shaped, scarlet-red flowers ...

"Earl Cunningham's America," an exhibition of 50 folk art paintings at the Smithsonian American Art Museum, leaves me faced with just that tension between the wild and the staid.