Pan

i.

mount olympus was a perfect paradise, but he knew paradise

before marble and gold-plated luxury.

he wandered the forests when they were new and untainted,

ruled lush jungles and clear streams, gently sloping hills and valleys,

reveled in a sun that warmed the earth and gave way to glorious life.

he used to be able to breathe.

ii.

he always knew not to play with fire. the others would curse and bless and love

those humans, but not him. never him.

his world was too precious to burn, too fragile to dare,

and when prometheus stole the still-flaming embers from mount olympus itself,

he wept. he saw the smoke that rose from those coals

and the flickering ambition in man’s eyes,

and he knew that his realm was primed to fall.

iii.

years are nothing to gods. they shouldn’t be, but he never thought that was true.

when he found the humans burning, burning, burning

his eons felt so very small.

ash littered the soil, choked the roots of the trees he called his own,

slid down the throats of the animals he had promised to protect.

heat rose into the winds that circled the earth, and even the spirits of the air

cowered within its strangling hold.

gods were perfect, he knew. they should be. that was the truth he had been promised.

but his world was crumbling around him, and all he heard were lies.

iv.

in his last few breaths, he remembers what it’s like to hope.

humans have always been so innovative.

he listens to them speak in terms he doesn’t understand.

they say things like energy and fossil fuels. metal screeches

and sparks fly, and when they dig up the soil, they do not plant seeds in the earth.

no, their plants are steel and like the giants of old.

their blades slice through the wind. somewhere, aeolus finds himself tethered by mortal aspirations.

v.

the only gods men worship are those of iron and steel,

machines that screech across the land and belch foul smoke,

but he looks closer and realizes that there are some that do not reek like the others.

there are some with zeus’s lightning crackling in their welded veins.

they whisper, electric. less gas. more mileage. more, more…

man will always want more. he is surprised to find

that now, they want more paradise.

vi.

they have noticed his passing. have cried it out in the streets, holding signs,

yelling until their voices are hoarse. they write. speak.

he’s always admired their persistence.

no one remembers that when prometheus first gave humans fire,

he never told them how to burn. their love for destruction

is in their blood, some might say, as much as ichor is inside of him.

and yet, the more he sees, the more he searches,

he discovers another side, a golden side

that yearns for the landscapes he used to roam

and calls for clear streams and cooler air. although he is fading, humans are not.

he can never tell whether that is good or bad. maybe the world is not so black and white.

gods cannot pray, but he hopes for a better ending.

a paradise that mirrored his own. a vision for the future that he will not live to see.

so as he closes his eyes for the last time, as they cry the great god Pan is dead,

with the smoke that rises in his lungs,

he breathes once more.