{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_64170/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_64170","id":"gutenberg_64170","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/64170","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Humour","Category: Mythology, Legends & Folklore","Category: Poetry","Humorous poetry","Mythology, Classical -- Poetry"],"text":"GAY GODS\n _and_\n MERRY MORTALS\n\n\n\n\n GAY GODS AND\n MERRY MORTALS\n\n SOME EXCURSIONS IN VERSE\n\n BY ROBERT J. SHORES\n\n [Illustration: (Colophon)]\n\n BROADWAY PUBLISHING CO.\n\n NEW YORK\n 1910\n\n\n\n\n COPYRIGHT, 1910,\n\n BY\n\n ROBERT J. SHORES\n\n\n\n\n TITLES AND PAGES\n\n\n Proem 7\n\n Act\u00e6on 8\n\n Adonis 10\n\n Proserpina 13\n\n Anaxarete 16\n\n Penelope 18\n\n Sappho 20\n\n Syrinx 22\n\n Tithonus 24\n\n Ariadne 27\n\n Io 29\n\n Dido 32\n\n Daphne 37\n\n\n\n\n Gay Gods and Merry Mortals\n\n\n PROEM.\n\n\n _Some ancient tales of Pagan days\n The author of this book relates\n Explaining how in divers ways\n The gods displayed their human traits;\n And how they oft in other years\n Set human beings by the ears._\n\n _Belike these rhymes recall to you\n The jingles of the poet Saxe;\n The poet here is Saxon, too,\n And so must needs relate his facts\n In such a way that they are clear\n And suited to the Saxon ear._\n\n _Some anecdotes which Homer told\n You\u2019ll miss in this; but reader, pray\n Consider, what was good of old\n Would never pass the mails to-day.\n And hence this history belated\n Has been--well, slightly expurgated._\n\n\n\n\n ACT\u00c6ON.\n\n _\u201cHe saw her charming, but he saw not half\n The charms her downcast modesty concealed.\u201d_\n\n --Thomson.\n\n\n Act\u00e6on, with the winding horn,\n Pursued the Chase in ardent youth\n And what he wore when he was born;\n (And little else, to tell the truth,\n For in those days of which I speak\n They just changed sandals once a week!)\n And as he wandered from the path,\n Chanced on Diana in her bath.\n\n All trembling, like a startled fawn,\n Upstarted then the Goddess chaste,\n Sprang from the pool the bank upon\n And donned her crescent in great haste,\n (For, to her credit be it said,\n She _did_ wear something on her head,)\n Then, the conventions satisfied\n Gazed on Act\u00e6on, haughty-eyed.\n\n Act\u00e6on tumbled in a trice\n That he had got himself in Dutch,\n But thought if quite polite and nice\n She would not mind the thing so much.\n So the poor fool in this fond hope\n Said, \u201cTell me, did you use Pear\u2019s Soap?\u201d\n Diana, vexed to hear the gag,\n Forthwith made Act\u00e6on a stag.\n\n The Moral is, if you should chance\n Upon a lady in the nude,\n Remember this sad circumstance,\n For she\u2019ll get even if you\u2019re rude;\n And conversation, if uncouth,\n May cost you dear in naked truth!\n\n\n\n\n ADONIS.\n\n\n Dan Cupid with a broken shaft\n Had bent his grand-dad, Jove, quite double,\n And then, to cap the climax, laughed;\n And so he found himself in trouble;\n Up on that august lap was yanked\n And thoroughly and soundly spanked,\n Till Cupid saddened, sobered, sore,\n Wished that his wings had sprouted lower.\n\n Dan Cupid then in rage and grief\n Straightway set out to find his mother,\n Who stitched upon her evening leaf,\n (She swore she didn\u2019t have another,\n Or, if she had, she still would swear\n She had none that was fit to wear.)\n And so the naughty youngster found her\n With leaves and sewing girls around her.\n\n When Venus heard her infant\u2019s wail,\n In apprehension she besought him\n To tell her all his angry tale;\n Then to her breast she, breathless, caught him.\n And, as his tear-stained face she kissed,\n Upon an arrow scratched her wrist.\n So in her veins in this strange fashion\n Was introduced the germ of passion.\n\n Indignant at the godlet\u2019s tale,\n She hastened to protest to Zeus,\n Her lovely cheek with anger pale,\n She was prepared to raise the deuce.\n But as Olympus\u2019 mount drew near,\n She spied Adonis chasing deer.\n And in a moment from her head\n All thoughts of wrath and Cupid fled.\n\n Straightway she hitched her gentle team\n Of doves, and left her carriage standing,\n For this fair youth to her doth seem\n A hero, comely and commanding--\n Although in fact and eke in truth\n He was a simple country youth;\n And so it happened that the Queen\n Of Beauty found him shy and green\n\n Now, Venus, veteran at the game\n Of flirting, would not be denied;\n As goddesses can feel no shame,\n She soon was anchored to his side;\n Do what he would, he could not shake her,\n Go where he would, he had to take her;\n Until one morn upon the plain\n She found the fair Adonis slain.\n\n This story should a warning be\n To maidens bold who wish to woo,\n For if you seek your lover, he\n Most certainly will not seek you;\n All men may love, but just the same\n They would be hunters--not the game.\n Adonis, so the story saith,\n Was really simply boared to death!\n\n\n\n\n PROSERPINA.\n\n \u201c_Forth reaching to the fruit, she pluk\u2019d, she eat;\n Earth felt the wound, and Nature from her seat\n Sighing through all her works gave signs of woe\n That all was lost._\u201d\n\n --Milton.\n\n\n On Aetna\u2019s isle Dis Pluto drove\n His devil-wagon one fine day,\n And passing through fair Enna\u2019s grove\n Beheld Proserpina at play;\n He asked, \u201cWill you not take a ride?\u201d\n \u201cYou\u2019re very kind,\u201d the maid replied,\n And stepped into his turn-out swell;\n And that was how she went to hell.\n\n For Pluto, whipping up his team,\n Sped on toward Tartarus in mirth,\n And when opposed by Cyane\u2019s stream,\n He took a short-cut through the earth.\n Nor paused, nor drew his rein before\n He heard Cerberus\u2019 welcome roar,\n And sniffed the smell of singeing soul\n By which he knew he\u2019d reached his goal.\n\n Ceres, Proserpina\u2019s mamma,\n Was almost crazed with grief and fear;\n (As to Proserpina\u2019s papa,\n His name I never chanced to hear),\n She cursed for all that she was worth\n The crops and fruits of Mother Earth;\n \u201cYou\u2019ll bear no fruit,\u201d she told the Ground,\n \u201cUntil my Prossie has been found!\u201d\n\n Jove, who beheld the farmer\u2019s need,\n And saw the season\u2019s crops all fail,\n Said, \u201cThis is Cereous, indeed,\n That fellow Dis should be in jail!\u201d\n \u201cI think,\u201d said Juno, \u201c\u2019twere as well--\n It does no good to give him hell;\u201d\n And so it might have been decreed\n But for one small pomegranate seed.\n\n In Hades Ceres\u2019 daughter sweet\n Was offered luscious bread and jam,\n But she was much too cross to eat\n And even scorned the deviled ham;\n Until at last she made a slip\n And swallowed a pomegranate pip;\n Now, they who eat in hell--alack!\n To earth may never more come back.\n\n The Moral is--don\u2019t take a chance\n Joy-riding with a strange chauffeur,\n Remember this sad circumstance\n Or you will get in trouble sure.\n If you _must_ go--don\u2019t go alone,\n The devil hates a chaperone.\n So mind the pips and look alive--\n Dis Pluto often goes to drive!\n\n\n\n\n ANAXARETE.\n\n\n In Cyprus dwelt Anaxarete,\n A maiden famous for her beauty,\n With disposition far from sweet,\n Who looked on flirting as a duty.\n \u2019Tis said she scarcely would despise\n At slaves and such to roll her eyes,\n \u2019Till most the men of Cyprus were\n In love, or half in love with her.\n\n Young Iphis was a worthy lad\n And born of parents poor but proud;\n He was a credit to his dad,\n Until one day while in a crowd\n He chanced a college chum to meet\n Out walking with Anaxarete;\n And when she rolled her lovely eyes\n Poor Iphis gasped in glad surprise.\n\n One glance, and Iphis was her slave,\n All other interests he forgot;\n Forgot to eat, forgot to shave,\n And wrote in rhyme a deal of rot\n To prove his heart was at the feet\n Of stony-cold Anaxarete;\n Who met his protests and his tears\n With cutting jests and crushing sneers.\n\n For Ana, as do all coquettes,\n So soon grew aweary of his wooing,\n And Iphis took to cigarettes,\n But still she answered \u201cNothing doing!\u201d\n And added--insult ne\u2019er forgotten!\n She thought his poetry was rotten;\n And finally to fix his place\n She slammed the door in Iphis\u2019 face.\n\n When Iphis saw that all was past,\n And knew that he could call no more,\n He took a rope and made it fast\n And hanged himself before her door.\n And, when his funeral passed her place,\n She thought to mock his pallid face;\n But Venus, leaning from her throne,\n Had seen, and turned the maid to stone.\n\n At Salamis, her statue still\n Points to the Moral of this tale--\n That any maid who flirts to kill\n Is really quite beyond the pale.\n And as for lovers; let me say\n If she is bored, just go away;\n No gentleman, and this I know,\n Will hang about when he\u2019s _de trop_!\n\n\n\n\n PENELOPE.\n\n \u201c_Good-nature and good-sense must ever join;\n To err is human, to forgive, divine._\u201d\n\n --Pope.\n\n\n Penelope, a Spartan maid,\n The brave Ulysses wooed and wed,\n She in a modest blush arrayed,\n He with a crown upon his head.\n Two hearts that beat as one--no tear\n Bedimmed their bliss for one whole year;\n At Ithaca they dwelt in peace--\n Not Ithaca, New York--but Greece.\n\n Alas! Scarce had been born their boy,\n An infant very fair and bright,\n When came a horrid war in Troy\n And papa had to go and fight.\n He left Penelope in tears--\n He went and stayed for years and years;\n And while away, I am afraid,\n He sometimes wooed another maid.\n\n In many lands he dwelt as guest\n Of ladies of exceeding beauty;\n Ulysses, it must be confessed,\n In flirting quite forgot his duty.\n He flirted here, he flirted there,\n In fact he flirted everywhere--\n With Calypso, Nausicaa, Circe--\n And he a man of family--Mercy!\n\n Penelope, dissolved in tears,\n Bewailed her spouse--the faithless Turk!\n And stood off suitors twenty years\n By doing endless fancy work.\n By day she made her stitches right,\n But pulled them out again by night,\n Until her husband, tired of larks,\n Came home and slew that bunch of sparks.\n\n The husband, even though he err\n And lead abroad a lively life,\n Dislikes, when he comes back to her,\n To find that others woo his wife.\n Ulysses lacked in morals--true,\n But she had quite enough for two--\n May Eros grant a wife to me\n As patient as Penelope!\n\n\n\n\n SAPPHO.\n\n\n Sappho was pretty all agree,\n Some say that she was stately,\n You cannot prove it, though, by me--\n I haven\u2019t seen her lately.\n In fact, I do not now recall\n I ever saw the girl at all.\n So we must take Dame Rumor\u2019s word\n That Sappho was, indeed, a bird.\n\n Now, Sappho in her younger years,\n Was wooed by men a-plenty,\n And setting suitors by the ears\n Amused her much at twenty.\n She swore she\u2019d not, at twenty-five,\n Accept the nicest man alive,\n And laughed to scorn the ardent Greek\n Who sought to kiss her damask cheek.\n\n But Sappho finds as years roll on,\n As oft a maid discovers,\n That when a maiden\u2019s youth is gone,\n Gone also are her lovers.\n No suitor hangs about her door\n To wait her coming as of yore;\n And what is worse than all above--\n Just at this stage she falls in love.\n\n Just what she does, if tales are truth,\n (Fie on that rascal Cupid!)\n Is to select a verdant youth,\n A handsome boy, but stupid!\n She tries her best to win his heart\n With all her once unfailing art,\n But finds--ah, Eros! think of that!\n That Phaon thinks her old and fat.\n\n Poor Sappho keenly feels the shame\n Of love quite unrequited,\n And though she knows herself to blame,\n She feels her life is blighted.\n And so when some one tells her if\n She will jump off a handy cliff\n \u2019Twill cure her of her love and dumps--\n She rushes out--ah! ah--she jumps!\n\n Ah, reader, let us pause right here\n To drop a tiny, briny tear;\n Alas! Alack! Oh, woeful sight--\n It cured her of her love, all right!\n Fair maidens, heed this circumstance--\n Don\u2019t jump off cliffs--jump at your chance!\n\n\n\n\n SYRINX.\n\n \u201c_Poor nymph--poor Pan--how he did weep to find\n Naught but a lovely sighing of the wind\n Along the reedy stream; a half-heard strain,\n Full of sweet desolation, balmy pain._\u201d\n\n --Keats.\n\n\n In Greece there dwelt in days gone by\n A maiden huntress, passing fair,\n Who lived beneath the open sky\n And dearly loved the open air.\n Although it really seems a shame\n To call a lady such a name,\n This lovely nymph was called, methinks,\n S-y-r-i-n-x, Syrinx.\n\n Syrinx, while following the Chase,\n Was seen one day by ardent Pan,\n A god of most repulsive face,\n A sort of burlesque on a man.\n If we can trust what ancients wrote,\n Poor Pan was really half a goat--\n Not like the Peter Pan to-day\n The Misses Chase and Adams play.\n\n When Pan began swift to pursue,\n The maiden in her terror fled,\n (I cannot blame her much, can you?)\n And ran \u2019till she was almost dead;\n But friendly spirits in a stream\n Had heard and understood her scream,\n And they had changed her in a wink\n To reeds upon the river\u2019s brink.\n\n The god, though thwarted in his scheme\n To win the nymph, was not dismayed.\n He plucked the reeds beside the stream\n And from them a \u201cSyrinx\u201d he made.\n The shepherd\u2019s pipes--so came to man\n The music of the Pipes o\u2019 Pan.\n\n The Moral? There is none; you see\n Pan was, as poets all agree,\n A most _immoral_ deity!\n\n\n\n\n TITHONUS.\n\n\n Tithonus, royal prince of Troy,\n All mortal maidens\u2019 beauty scorning,\n Chose for his love, presumptuous boy!\n Aurora, goddess of the morning.\n To her he wrote his royal rhymes,\n For her he saved his royal dimes;\n So well, indeed, he played his part,\n He won at last the goddess\u2019 heart.\n\n Aurora, wise as gods must be,\n Was well aware that all men perish,\n And knowing this she bent the knee,\n (What won\u2019t we do for those we cherish!)\n And thus she prayed to Jove on high:\n \u201cOh, _please_ don\u2019t let Tithonus die!\u201d\n And this, the whole of her endeavor--\n That Tithy, dear, might live forever.\n\n Now, Jove, although a deity,\n Was very fond of mortal ladies,\n And more than once, he, even he,\n Had grieved to see them go to Hades.\n \u201cI quite agree with you,\u201d he said,\n \u201cTithonus would be dull if dead.\n So be content, I, even I,\n Decree Tithonus shall not die!\u201d\n\n Aurora, full of love and joy,\n Laughed out in Pluto\u2019s face of gloom,\n And hastened off to tell her boy\n That she had saved him from the tomb.\n But, ah, how foolish to forget\n One other evil to be met!\n \u2019Tis sad to say, but must be told,\n She quite forgot he might grow old.\n\n Grow old he did, as most men do,\n Grew gray and bald and round of tummy;\n Grew deaf, grew cross and crabbed, too;\n Grew bent and wrinkled like a mummy.\n \u201cOh, Gee! Oh, Fudge! My Sakes! Good Lands!\n What\u2019s this I\u2019ve got upon my hands?\u201d\n Aurora cried, nor gave a hang\n Who heard her use such vulgar slang.\n\n \u201cAlas!\u201d she cried, \u201cis it decreed--\n And it is even right and proper?\n That I forever more should feed\n A foolish, mulish old grasshopper?\u201d\n Tithonus hopped--for, you must know\n That what a goddess says is _so_!\n Tithonus, stricken but resigned,\n Hopped out of sight and out of mind.\n\n The Moral is--that age and youth\n Have aye been illy yoked together,\n For love cannot survive, in truth,\n A prolonged spell of wintry weather.\n So, when you hear your lady sigh:\n \u201cAlas! My Love will _never_ die!\u201d\n Just heed Aurora\u2019s hint, I say,\n And hope no more--but hop away!\n\n\n\n\n ARIADNE.\n\n \u201c_Fool, not to know that love endures no tie,\n And Jove but laughs at lover\u2019s perjury._\u201d\n\n --Dryden.\n\n\n The Minotaur, a horrid beast\n Which made its food of maidens fair\n And handsome youths, to say the least\n Had given Athens quite a scare.\n Since Athens sent each year to Crete\n A batch of folks for him to eat;\n \u2019Till on King Minos Athens soured,\n For no one likes to be devoured.\n\n Just as the folks of Athens had\n Prepared to risk their all in war,\n Young Theseus, to the King, his dad,\n Proffered his services and swore\n That he would go to Crete and slay\n The Minotaur without delay;\n And so with helmet-box and grip\n He started on the fateful trip.\n\n Now, Minos had a daughter fair,\n Who was humane as well as Cretan,\n And all in all, she did not care\n To see the handsome stranger eaten.\n So she resolved that she would aid\n Young Theseus in his escapade,\n Although she knew her royal dad\n Would certainly be hopping mad.\n\n The Minotaur, King Minos kept\n Within a sort of mystic maze,\n And in those corridors, unswept,\n A man might wander, lost, for days.\n And Ariadne\u2019s scheme, in fine,\n Was just to take a ball of twine\n And let the youth unroll the thing\n And so be guided by the string.\n\n All went as planned--oh, lucky star!\n The sword of Theseus soon was wet,\n And slaughtered was the Minotaur;\n The king had lost his gruesome pet.\n The lovers fled the monarch\u2019s wrath\n But even on the homeward path\n The hero, bored to hear her weep,\n On Noxas left her fast asleep.\n\n The Moral is--you should not string\n Young men, unless you know them well;\n For love is an uncertain thing\n And strange young men, however swell,\n If loosely tied and quickly bored,\n Will quit you of their own accord.\n\n\n\n\n Io.\n\n\n Io and Jove were holding hands\n One day beside a sylvan stream\n And drawing hearts upon the sands--\n Epitome of Love\u2019s young dream!\n Fair Io murmured, \u201cOn my life,\n Why took you Juno for your wife?\n The ox-eyed Juno! In good sooth\n Peroxide would be nearer truth!\u201d\n\n \u201cTut-tut!\u201d said Jove, \u201cyou should not speak\n So slightingly of my good spouse;\n She has been busy all this week\n Up on Olympus cleaning house.\n And while she sweeps, I\u2019ve naught to do\n But stay here making love to you!\u201d\n \u201cShe would do well,\u201d the maid replies,\n \u201cTo sweep the dust from out her eyes.\u201d\n\n Alas for Io! Juno heard\n Her idle words within the hour;\n Some gossip of a bee or bird\n Repeated them from flower to flower,\n Until \u2019twas whispered by the leaves\n At Juno\u2019s threshold--\u201cJove deceives!\u201d\n \u201cDeceived again?\u201d she cried in rage;\n To see what happened, turn the page.\n\n Or, if the printer can find room\n To print another line on this,\n I\u2019ll state that Juno heard a boom\n Of thunder--which is when gods kiss.\n And hurried angrily to where\n She thought to find the erring pair;\n But reaching there she saw, I vow,\n No maiden, but a heifer cow!\n\n For Jove, grown wise in other years\n In which he got his just deserts,\n Was ever pricking up his ears\n To hear the swish of Juno\u2019s skirts.\n So, when he heard her on his trail,\n He made his hat a milking pail\n And changed poor Io, trembling now,\n Into the semblance of a cow.\n\n But Juno was not quite a fool\n And saw at once her husband\u2019s trick,\n And, though appearing calm and cool,\n Resolved to make that heifer sick.\n \u201cA lovely cow!\u201d cried she. \u201cDivine!\n I cannot rest \u2019till it is mine!\u201d\n Jove cleared his throat and smoothed his vest\n But had to grant his wife\u2019s request.\n\n Alas for Io! Juno sent\n A gad-fly which beset her sore,\n And drove her--which was the intent--\n From sea to sea and shore to shore.\n To Egypt and the Barbadoes,\n Perhaps to Iowa--who knows?\n The gad-fly followed where she went\n And stung her to his heart\u2019s content.\n\n And so it happens, even now,\n Although she vainly tries to grab it,\n The gad-fly stings the gentle cow--\n He keeps it up from force of habit.\n\n\n\n\n DIDO.\n\n \u201c_Up, then, Melpomene! the mournfulest Muse of Nine,\n Such cause of mourning never hadst afore;\n Up, grislie ghostes! and up, my rufull rhyme!_\u201d\n\n --Spenser.\n\n\n \u201cOn such a night,\u201d as Shakespeare once remarked,\n On such a night as lovers love to spoon,\n Aeneas in his cockleshell embarked\n And left poor Dido weeping \u2019neath the moon;\n A palm-leaf in her hand, as Shakespeare said,\n The crown of ancient Carthage on her head;\n \u2019Twas thus Aeneas jilted the fair dame\n And put the chivalry of Greece to shame.\n\n Fair Dido, to go back a little way,\n Had fled the vengeance of her brother\u2019s ire,\n Who slew her wealthy husband one fine day\n And chased his widowed sister out of Tyre;\n Pygmalion was the name he bore at court,\n Though Dido always called him \u201cPyg\u201d for short;\n Methinks the greedy nature of the youth\n Made Dido\u2019s nickname fit him well in truth.\n\n Arriving, then, on Afric\u2019s sunny shore\n With some few friends who followed in her train,\n She built herself some houses and a store,\n Laid out a street and called it Lover\u2019s Lane.\n And since the town was hers, none could gainsay\n Her right to royal rule and social sway;\n And so it is quite easy to be seen\n How, when Aeneas came, he found her queen.\n\n Aeneas and some refugees from Troy\n Were wandering about uncharted seas;\n Aeneas had a cold--unlucky boy!\n (\u2019Twould wring your heart to hear his mournful sneeze!)\n In fact, they all were troubled as to nose,\n Clad as they were in lightest marching clothes;\n So when they came at last to Dido\u2019s land,\n They were a sick and sorry-looking band.\n\n \u201cNot unacquainted with distress,\u201d she said,\n \u201cI\u2019ve learned to succor all the down and out;\u201d\n Straightway she had them all tucked into bed,\n And caused her heralds in the street to shout:\n \u201cQueen Dido seeks a sovereign cure for chills,\n Bring mustard plasters, poultices and pills;\n The victor she\u2019ll reward and make his name\n A synonym for fortune and for fame.\u201d\n\n As always, when incentive is supplied,\n Some pharmacist got busy on the spot,\n Made little pills with quinine stuffed inside;\n She made him rich, but famous he is not.\n We take them now, but who is there can tell\n The doctor who first served mankind so well?\n But let us haste--this yarn, beyond all doubt,\n Grows dull apace, and slow, and long-drawn-out.\n\n To cut it short; she loved him; he loved her;\n He stuck around; she made him quite at home;\n The two were quite domestic I infer\n Until Aeneas took a boat for Rome.\n Rome wasn\u2019t there--but what cared he for that?\n \u2019Most any town will do to dodge a flat;\n Aeneas felt that he could love that spot,\n Where\u2019er it be--so be Dido was not.\n\n Dido, deserted, built a funeral pyre,\n On which she mounted with a wicked knife;\n She bade a servant set the thing afire,\n And with the dagger put an end to life.\n So perished Dido; died, oh died for love!\n So Dido died, as I have said above,\n Sweet Dido, loveliest lady of the land,\n On such a night--a palm-leaf in her hand!\n\n The Moral? This is not a moral tale.\n What do we learn from it? Well, I should say\n We learn that merry widows sometimes fail,\n And cutting didoes doesn\u2019t always pay.\n\n\n\n\n DAPHNE.\n\n\n Fair Daphne was a modest miss,\n A convert of the \u201cKiss Not\u201d fad,\n Who swore no man should know her kiss,\n Unless it be her dear old dad.\n E\u2019en as a tot it caused her grief\n To play at \u201cDrop the handkerchief\u201d;\n She called each youthful suitor, \u201cBrute!\u201d\n Who offered her a chaste salute.\n\n In vain her father bade her wed,\n In vain he urged, in vain entreated;\n She only shook her pretty head,\n And all his arguments defeated.\n \u201cTalk not of men,\u201d she said. \u201cTo me,\n Diana\u2019s priestess I would be,\n And range the woods, heart-free, foot-loose,\n To kill the chipmunk and the moose.\u201d\n\n \u201cAh, well!\u201d he sighed (It is a shame,\n And rather mars this graceful verse,\n I cannot rhyme his beastly name),\n \u201cAh, well! Perhaps you might do worse.\n I longed for grand-sons, but\u201d--a sigh--\n \u201cThe cost of living sure is high;\n I\u2019m tired of fish and long for liver!\u201d\n Her pa, Peneus, was a river.\n\n And so it happened, Daphne did\n Devote her days unto the Chase;\n Whenever she saw a man, she hid;\n Nor would she show her pretty face\n To any man except her father;\n A modest little maiden? Rather!\n So modest she--she would not flirt\n Her dainty little hunting skirt!\n\n Though best-laid plans of mice and men\n May go astray; no mouse, no man,\n Can hope to bring the wit in play\n That e\u2019en the dullest godling can.\n For gods beat human folks all hollow--\n Especially the god Apollo;\n Apollo, who was far from stupid,\n Had heard of Daphne from Dan Cupid,\n And he resolved that he would see\n How true young Cupid\u2019s tale might be.\n\n He laid in wait and spied the maid,\n Who tripped along the woodland path,\n In haste and somewhat disarrayed,\n Intent upon her evening bath,\n Not dreaming that a soul was near,\n Until upon her startled ear\n There broke a single love-lorn sigh,\n Which warned her that the god was nigh.\n\n Then like a startled fawn she fled,\n The grass scarce bending \u2019neath her feet,\n Her hair out-streaming from her head,\n Her face as pale as any sheet.\n And as she fled the god pursued,\n (A most ungentle act, and rude!)\n And gained, and gained, and gained so fast,\n She thought her breath must fail at last!\n\n \u201cHelp! Help!\u201d she cried. \u201cPeneus, aid\n Your daughter--save, oh, save me now!\n So weary and so sore afraid!\u201d\n And in a moment on her brow\n Some tiny twigs began to grow,\n Her feet took root--for, you must know,\n Her father, by divine decree,\n Transformed his daughter to a tree!\n\n \u201cAh!\u201d sighed Apollo, \u201cwhat is this?\n My tree! You can\u2019t escape me now!\u201d\n Upon her trunk he pressed a kiss--\n Poor Daphne blushed in every bough;\n \u201cYou have,\u201d said he, \u201ca lovely limb;\u201d\n (Say, honest, I\u2019m ashamed of him!)\n How sad to see a perfect lady\n Become a character so shady!\n\n The Moral is--be careful how\n You dress when you go out to swim;\n Poor Daphne might be hunting now,\n Instead of wearing trunks for him!\n\n\n\n\n [Illustration]\n\n HERE ENDETH\n\n [Illustration]\n\n THIS LITTLE BOOK\n\n [Illustration]\n\n OF\n\n [Illustration]\n\n PAGAN POEMS\n\n [Illustration]","title":"Gay gods and merry mortals: some excursions in verse","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":4304}