Rudyard Kipling's Verse, Inclusive Edition, 1885-1918/Pan in Vermont
Pan in Vermont
1893
(About the 15th of this month you may expect our Mr., with the usual Spring Seed, etc. Catalogues.—Florists Announcement..)
It's forty in the shade to-day the spouting eaves declare;
The boulders nose above the drift, the southern slopes are bare;
Hub-deep in slush Apollo's car swings north along the Zod-
iac. Good lack, the Spring is back, and Pan is on the road!
His house is Gee & Tellus' Sons,—so goes his jest with men—
He sold us Zeus knows what last year; he'll take us in again.
Disguised behind a livery-team, fur-coated, rubber-shod—
Yet Apis from the bull-pen lows—he knows his brother God!
Now down the lines of tasselled pines the yearning whispers wake—
Pitys of old thy love behold. Come in for Hermes' sake!
How long since that so-Boston boot with reeling Maenads ran?
Numen adest! Let be the rest. Pipe and we pay, O Pan.
(What though his phlox and hollyhocks ere half a month demised?
What though his ampelopsis clambered not as advertised?
Though every seed was guaranteed and every standard true—
Forget, forgive they did not live! Believe, and buy anew!)
Now o'er a careless knee he flings the painted page abroad—
Such bloom hath never eye beheld this side the Eden Sword;
Such fruit Pomona marks her own, yea, Liber oversees
That we may reach (one dollar each) the Lost Hesperides!
Serene, assenting, unabashed, he writes our orders down:—
Blue Asphodel on all our paths—a few true bays for crown—
Uncankered bud, immortal flower, and leaves that never fall—
Apples of Gold, of Youth, of Health—and—thank you, Pan, that's all.
He's off along the drifted pent to catch the Windsor train,
And swindle every citizen from Keene to Lake Champlain;
But where his goat's-hoof cut the crust—beloved, look below—
He's left us (I'll forgive him all) the may-flower 'neath her snow!