GAY GODS
and
MERRY MORTALS

GAY GODS AND
MERRY MORTALS

SOME EXCURSIONS IN VERSE
BY ROBERT J. SHORES

BROADWAY PUBLISHING CO.
NEW YORK
1910

COPYRIGHT, 1910,
BY
ROBERT J. SHORES

TITLES AND PAGES

Gay Gods and Merry Mortals

PROEM.

SOME ancient tales of Pagan days

The author of this book relates

Explaining how in divers ways

The gods displayed their human traits;

And how they oft in other years

Set human beings by the ears.

Belike these rhymes recall to you

The jingles of the poet Saxe;

The poet here is Saxon, too,

And so must needs relate his facts

In such a way that they are clear

And suited to the Saxon ear.

Some anecdotes which Homer told

You’ll miss in this; but reader, pray

Consider, what was good of old

Would never pass the mails to-day.

And hence this history belated

Has been—well, slightly expurgated.

ACTÆON.

“He saw her charming, but he saw not half
The charms her downcast modesty concealed.”

—Thomson.

ACTÆON, with the winding horn,

Pursued the Chase in ardent youth

And what he wore when he was born;

(And little else, to tell the truth,

For in those days of which I speak

They just changed sandals once a week!)

And as he wandered from the path,

Chanced on Diana in her bath.

All trembling, like a startled fawn,

Upstarted then the Goddess chaste,

Sprang from the pool the bank upon

And donned her crescent in great haste,

(For, to her credit be it said,

She did wear something on her head,)

Then, the conventions satisfied

Gazed on Actæon, haughty-eyed.

Actæon tumbled in a trice

That he had got himself in Dutch,

But thought if quite polite and nice

She would not mind the thing so much.

So the poor fool in this fond hope

Said, “Tell me, did you use Pear’s Soap?”

Diana, vexed to hear the gag,

Forthwith made Actæon a stag.

The Moral is, if you should chance

Upon a lady in the nude,

Remember this sad circumstance,

For she’ll get even if you’re rude;

And conversation, if uncouth,

May cost you dear in naked truth!

ADONIS.

DAN CUPID with a broken shaft

Had bent his grand-dad, Jove, quite double,

And then, to cap the climax, laughed;

And so he found himself in trouble;

Up on that august lap was yanked

And thoroughly and soundly spanked,

Till Cupid saddened, sobered, sore,

Wished that his wings had sprouted lower.

Dan Cupid then in rage and grief

Straightway set out to find his mother,

Who stitched upon her evening leaf,

(She swore she didn’t have another,

Or, if she had, she still would swear

She had none that was fit to wear.)

And so the naughty youngster found her

With leaves and sewing girls around her.

When Venus heard her infant’s wail,

In apprehension she besought him

To tell her all his angry tale;

Then to her breast she, breathless, caught him.

And, as his tear-stained face she kissed,

Upon an arrow scratched her wrist.

So in her veins in this strange fashion

Was introduced the germ of passion.

Indignant at the godlet’s tale,

She hastened to protest to Zeus,

Her lovely cheek with anger pale,

She was prepared to raise the deuce.

But as Olympus’ mount drew near,

She spied Adonis chasing deer.

And in a moment from her head

All thoughts of wrath and Cupid fled.

Straightway she hitched her gentle team

Of doves, and left her carriage standing,

For this fair youth to her doth seem

A hero, comely and commanding—

Although in fact and eke in truth

He was a simple country youth;

And so it happened that the Queen

Of Beauty found him shy and green

Now, Venus, veteran at the game

Of flirting, would not be denied;

As goddesses can feel no shame,

She soon was anchored to his side;

Do what he would, he could not shake her,

Go where he would, he had to take her;

Until one morn upon the plain

She found the fair Adonis slain.

This story should a warning be

To maidens bold who wish to woo,

For if you seek your lover, he

Most certainly will not seek you;

All men may love, but just the same

They would be hunters—not the game.

Adonis, so the story saith,

Was really simply boared to death!

PROSERPINA.

“Forth reaching to the fruit, she pluk’d, she eat;
Earth felt the wound, and Nature from her seat
Sighing through all her works gave signs of woe
That all was lost.”

—Milton.

ON Aetna’s isle Dis Pluto drove

His devil-wagon one fine day,

And passing through fair Enna’s grove

Beheld Proserpina at play;

He asked, “Will you not take a ride?”

“You’re very kind,” the maid replied,

And stepped into his turn-out swell;

And that was how she went to hell.

For Pluto, whipping up his team,

Sped on toward Tartarus in mirth,

And when opposed by Cyane’s stream,

He took a short-cut through the earth.

Nor paused, nor drew his rein before

He heard Cerberus’ welcome roar,

And sniffed the smell of singeing soul

By which he knew he’d reached his goal.

Ceres, Proserpina’s mamma,

Was almost crazed with grief and fear;

(As to Proserpina’s papa,

His name I never chanced to hear),

She cursed for all that she was worth

The crops and fruits of Mother Earth;

“You’ll bear no fruit,” she told the Ground,

“Until my Prossie has been found!”

Jove, who beheld the farmer’s need,

And saw the season’s crops all fail,

Said, “This is Cereous, indeed,

That fellow Dis should be in jail!”

“I think,” said Juno, “’twere as well—

It does no good to give him hell;”

And so it might have been decreed

But for one small pomegranate seed.

In Hades Ceres’ daughter sweet

Was offered luscious bread and jam,

But she was much too cross to eat

And even scorned the deviled ham;

Until at last she made a slip

And swallowed a pomegranate pip;

Now, they who eat in hell—alack!

To earth may never more come back.

The Moral is—don’t take a chance

Joy-riding with a strange chauffeur,

Remember this sad circumstance

Or you will get in trouble sure.

If you must go—don’t go alone,

The devil hates a chaperone.

So mind the pips and look alive—

Dis Pluto often goes to drive!

ANAXARETE.

IN Cyprus dwelt Anaxarete,

A maiden famous for her beauty,

With disposition far from sweet,

Who looked on flirting as a duty.

’Tis said she scarcely would despise

At slaves and such to roll her eyes,

’Till most the men of Cyprus were

In love, or half in love with her.

Young Iphis was a worthy lad

And born of parents poor but proud;

He was a credit to his dad,

Until one day while in a crowd

He chanced a college chum to meet

Out walking with Anaxarete;

And when she rolled her lovely eyes

Poor Iphis gasped in glad surprise.

One glance, and Iphis was her slave,

All other interests he forgot;

Forgot to eat, forgot to shave,

And wrote in rhyme a deal of rot

To prove his heart was at the feet

Of stony-cold Anaxarete;

Who met his protests and his tears

With cutting jests and crushing sneers.

For Ana, as do all coquettes,

So soon grew aweary of his wooing,

And Iphis took to cigarettes,

But still she answered “Nothing doing!”

And added—insult ne’er forgotten!

She thought his poetry was rotten;

And finally to fix his place

She slammed the door in Iphis’ face.

When Iphis saw that all was past,

And knew that he could call no more,

He took a rope and made it fast

And hanged himself before her door.

And, when his funeral passed her place,

She thought to mock his pallid face;

But Venus, leaning from her throne,

Had seen, and turned the maid to stone.

At Salamis, her statue still

Points to the Moral of this tale—

That any maid who flirts to kill

Is really quite beyond the pale.

And as for lovers; let me say

If she is bored, just go away;

No gentleman, and this I know,

Will hang about when he’sde trop!

PENELOPE.

“Good-nature and good-sense must ever join;
To err is human, to forgive, divine.”

—Pope.

PENELOPE, a Spartan maid,

The brave Ulysses wooed and wed,

She in a modest blush arrayed,

He with a crown upon his head.

Two hearts that beat as one—no tear

Bedimmed their bliss for one whole year;

At Ithaca they dwelt in peace—

Not Ithaca, New York—but Greece.

Alas! Scarce had been born their boy,

An infant very fair and bright,

When came a horrid war in Troy

And papa had to go and fight.

He left Penelope in tears—

He went and stayed for years and years;

And while away, I am afraid,

He sometimes wooed another maid.

In many lands he dwelt as guest

Of ladies of exceeding beauty;

Ulysses, it must be confessed,

In flirting quite forgot his duty.

He flirted here, he flirted there,

In fact he flirted everywhere—

With Calypso, Nausicaa, Circe—

And he a man of family—Mercy!

Penelope, dissolved in tears,

Bewailed her spouse—the faithless Turk!

And stood off suitors twenty years

By doing endless fancy work.

By day she made her stitches right,

But pulled them out again by night,

Until her husband, tired of larks,

Came home and slew that bunch of sparks.

The husband, even though he err

And lead abroad a lively life,

Dislikes, when he comes back to her,

To find that others woo his wife.

Ulysses lacked in morals—true,

But she had quite enough for two—

May Eros grant a wife to me

As patient as Penelope!

SAPPHO.

SAPPHO was pretty all agree,

Some say that she was stately,

You cannot prove it, though, by me—

I haven’t seen her lately.

In fact, I do not now recall

I ever saw the girl at all.

So we must take Dame Rumor’s word

That Sappho was, indeed, a bird.

Now, Sappho in her younger years,

Was wooed by men a-plenty,

And setting suitors by the ears

Amused her much at twenty.

She swore she’d not, at twenty-five,

Accept the nicest man alive,

And laughed to scorn the ardent Greek