While reading about the poet E. E. Cummings earlier this week, I came across a website called shmoop.com.  It is a site that provides help for students in a variety of ways – some of it free and some for a fee.  Among other things, the site has numerous learning guides that are supposedly prepared by university Ph.D. candidates.

One of those guides was an extended discussion of Cummings’ poem, “all in green went my love riding.”  The author continued for more than 20 web pages talking about how Cummings used a ballad form, though the meter was in trochees rather than iambs; the repeated lines and repeated references to colors; the movement from the water to the meadow to the mountains to death; and many possible themes for the poem.

After reading through all of that, I was not impressed.  I am afraid I started off with a negative attitude because the second paragraph of the Shmoop introduction began, “Edward Estings Cummings was born the son of a Harvard professor . . .”

Cummings’ middle name was actually Estlin, and he often used the name Estlin rather than Edward when he was young.  I don’t know if the Shmoop author was guilty of a mere typographical error or poor scholarship, but that mistake made me suspect of the rest of the extensive article.

My suspicions were justified because the article failed to even recognize the actual subject of the poem.  The Shmoop summary of what the poem is about reads as follows:

“Once we get to the end of the poem, we realize that our speaker is pretty linguistically dexterous. The whole poem turns upon a pun, one that the speaker is building up rather craftily right from the very beginning. The speaker thinks about the heart as a “hart”—a deer—and the entire poem springs from that metaphor. He invents an entire scene in which deer (or harts) get chased by a clever huntress. Then the deer (or, um, his heart) is captured—by love. All of the elaborate imaginings, the green meadows and the steep mountains, could be read as figments of a very, very love-struck imagination.”

In fact, Cummings did not “invent” the scenes of the poem.  Rather, he was poetically retelling of the ancient Greek myth about Artemis and Actaeon.  Granted, the use of the first person in the poem implies that the myth is metaphor.  Still, the poem clearly finds its genesis in that myth.

Artemis, who was known as Diana by the Romans, was a goddess of the moon and the hunt and the patroness of wild animals.  She was also a virginal deity, and one day as she was bathing in the woods a hunter named Actaeon passed by and saw her without clothing.  Artemis felt that her chastity had been compromised and told him that if he ever said another word, he would be turned into a stag.  Just then, Actaeon heard a bugle call from his hunting party and he called out to his friends.  As soon as he did, he became a stag.  He did not realize what had happened until he came to a stream and saw his reflection in the clear water.  He raised his head to Mt. Olympus to petition the gods for mercy, but it was too late.  His trained hunting dogs did not recognize him.  They saw only the stag he had become and killed him.

At least that is the gist of the story as recounted by the Hellenic poet Callimachus.  An alternative version says that Artemis turned Actaeon into a stag as punishment for his competing with Zeus for the favors of the beautiful Semele.  Perhaps that is the story Cummings was telling here because at the time he wrote it, right after World War I, he was famously involved in an affair with a married woman – who later became his first wife.

Or perhaps not.  It is hard to tell with these poets.  I could probably go on for 20 pages about the poem, just as the Shmoop author did; but I will spare the reader that discussion for now.  I need, instead, to explain how this poem becomes a Song of the Week.

Peter Schickele is a composer, musician, musicologist and radio host who is best known for his comedic “discovery” of the works of P. D. Q., Bach, a fictional character who was supposedly the youngest and least talented of the sons of Johann Sebastian Bach.  During the 1960s, Schickele worked as an arranger for various musicians, including folk singers like Buffy Ste. Marie and Joan Baez.

In 1968, Baez put out a very interesting album called Baptism, made up of poetry read and sung by her, set to music composed by Schickele.  It included works by such luminaries as James Joyce, Federico Garcia Lorca, John Donne, Arthur Rimbaud and others.  One of the best “songs” from the album is her version of “all in green went my love riding.”  I would like to play it for the Shmoop writer so he could be calm and focused enough to complete his research; but he’s not here.  So, I would like to play it for whomever has a three minutes to listen.

all in green went my love riding
By E. E. Cummings

All in green went my love riding
on a great horse of gold
into the silver dawn.

four lean hounds crouched low and smiling
the merry deer ran before.

Fleeter be they than dappled dreams
the swift sweet deer
the red rare deer.

Four red roebuck at a white water
the cruel bugle sang before.

Horn at hip went my love riding
riding the echo down
into the silver dawn.

four lean hounds crouched low and smiling
the level meadows ran before.

Softer be they than slippered sleep
the lean lithe deer
the fleet flown deer.

Four fleet does at a gold valley
the famished arrow sang before.

Bow at belt went my love riding
riding the mountain down
into the silver dawn.

four lean hounds crouched low and smiling
the sheer peaks ran before.

Paler be they than daunting death
the sleek slim deer
the tall tense deer.

Four tall stags at the green mountain
the lucky hunter sang before.

All in green went my love riding
on a great horse of gold
into the silver dawn.

Four lean hounds crouched low and smiling
my heart fell dead before.