Poem for Thursday and Renaissance Faire Music

A Musical Instrument 

By Elizabeth Barrett Browning 

I. 

What was he doing, the great god Pan, 

    Down in the reeds by the river ? 

Spreading ruin and scattering ban, 

Splashing and paddling with hoofs of a goat, 

And breaking the golden lilies afloat 

    With the dragon-fly on the river. 

II. 

He tore out a reed, the great god Pan, 

    From the deep cool bed of the river : 

The limpid water turbidly ran, 

And the broken lilies a-dying lay, 

And the dragon-fly had fled away, 

    Ere he brought it out of the river. 

III. 

High on the shore sat the great god Pan, 

    While turbidly flowed the river ; 

And hacked and hewed as a great god can, 

With his hard bleak steel at the patient reed, 

Till there was not a sign of a leaf indeed 

    To prove it fresh from the river. 

IV. 

He cut it short, did the great god Pan, 

    (How tall it stood in the river !) 

Then drew the pith, like the heart of a man, 

Steadily from the outside ring, 

And notched the poor dry empty thing 

    In holes, as he sate by the river. 

V. 

This is the way,' laughed the great god Pan, 

    Laughed while he sate by the river,) 

The only way, since gods began 

To make sweet music, they could succeed.' 

Then, dropping his mouth to a hole in the reed, 

    He blew in power by the river. 

VI. 

Sweet, sweet, sweet, O Pan ! 

    Piercing sweet by the river ! 

Blinding sweet, O great god Pan ! 

The sun on the hill forgot to die, 

And the lilies revived, and the dragon-fly 

    Came back to dream on the river. 

VII. 

Yet half a beast is the great god Pan, 

    To laugh as he sits by the river, 

Making a poet out of a man : 

The true gods sigh for the cost and pain, — 

For the reed which grows nevermore again 

    As a reed with the reeds in the river. 

-------- 

My Thursday started early because I had a 9 am semiannual physical (with the PA because after the doctor canceled on me last week, she had no openings till the end of November and I have prescriptions I need renewed before then, though I really liked the PA and she spent more time with me than most doctors ever have). In the afternoon I went with Paul to his eye doctor, though I walked to That's Entertainment and then to Elm Park to enjoy the animals and fall color for an hour. 

In between we watched most of the Guardians victory while working on our computers, and now we're watching what's probably the end of the Dodgers season after my Thursday night chat and the start of the new season of The Diplomat, which is enormous fun to watch, four main actors at the top of their game and with great chemistry. Because of chat, I didn't have time to upload my park photos, so here are some of the musicians and musical instruments from Mystic Rhythms at King Richard's Faire: