(Pan to be found in Maryanne & Marigold's garden....with peanuts!) xo
Stumbled across this lovely poem in a 1938 edition of the Young Folks Shelf of Books
that I found in a thrift bin. The entire book was a lovely read, all the old poems I remembered from my childhood. (and quite a few that would cause such an uproar today in our sanitized world!) ;)
When did all those classics go away I wonder?
And the vocabulary! Oh, how I relish the Old Words!
Since I adore All Things Pan, and Pan is so very hard to find-especially in children's lit, I was particularly taken with this piece.
I see it as a brilliant diversity piece (for the time period) with the mention of "as Christian as yourself" and find it to be very Unitarian in its message.
And really, who *doesn't* want a little pagan faun piping on their porch? :)
I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.
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THE VISITOR
by Patrick R. Chalmers
The white goat Amaryllis,
She wandered at her will
At time of daffodillies
Afar and up the hill:
We hunted and we halloa'd
And back she came at dawn
But what d'you think had followed?--
A little, pagan Faun!
His face was like a berry,
His ears were high and pricked:
Tip-tap-his hoofs came merry
As up the hill he clicked;
A junket for his winning
We set in dairy delf;
He ate it pert and grinning-
As Christian as yourself!
He stayed about the steading
A fortnight, say, or more;
A blanket for his bedding
We spread beside the door;
And when the cocks crowed clearly
Before the dawn was ripe,
He called the milkmaids cheerly
Upon a reedy pipe!
That fortnight of his staying
The work went smooth as silk:
The hens were all in laying
The cows were all in milk;
And the-and then one morning
The maids woke up at day
Without his oaten warning-
And found he'd gone away.
He left no trace behind him;
Bit still the milkmaids deem
That they, perhaps may find him
With butter and with cream:
Beside the door they set them
In bowl and golden pat,
But no one comes to get them-
Unless maybe, the cat.
The white goat Amaryllis,
She wanders at her will
At time of daffodillies,
Away up Woolcombe hill;
She stay until the morrow,
Then back she comes at dawn;
But never-to our sorrow-
The little, pagan Faun.
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