Three Songs of Pan

(story)

I was feeling sad about love.  Even as a person of some experience, I often feel so trapped and hopeless, as if I cannot possibly have what I want, sexually.  Worse, I’m not sure I really know what I want. 

Wandering in this mood across a meadow in the dreary spring rain, I came upon Pan among the sheep.  He was sitting in the grass in an elegant pin-stripe suit and hounds-tooth coat, his hooves manicured like patent leather, his beard trimmed, his hair perfect under the steady drizzle.  He seemed to be reading a sodden book, Ovid’s Art of Love, in the Latin. 

He looked up at me and smiled.  As always, I couldn’t keep my eyes from his crotch, the discreet bulge under expensive fabric, writhing subtly like a trapped snake.  As always, heat rolled through me. 

"Sit down," he said.  "You need a song."  Lowering myself beside him, I noticed standing water on the ground.  As soon as I sat, it soaked the back of my pants and wrapped my posterior in a cold hand. 

I felt his eyes on me, and met them, swam in them.  I offered myself to him in fear and hope, as a pipe on which to play his tunes.  He smiled again.  Putting an arm over my shoulder, he said, "This is a song of understanding." 

1.  Song of Understanding

He sang.  There were no words.  He started by showing me all the others, the animals, fish, insects, even plants, how intense and full of sacrifice sex is, because nothing, nothing is more important.  For all of us, it is better to have good sex and die than not to have it. 

He showed me different strategies, the herd males with their huge balls, and the monogamous creatures, who bond with their mates so as to ensure the survival of children during vulnerable infant years. 

I saw how the monogamous bond is primary but not exclusive, and how naturally it dissolves at the turn of four-year cycles unless renewed. 

I saw that obsession, jealousy, guilt, embarrassment and shame are rooted deep in our biology. 

Then he sang of warlike tribes, where men went off to kill and raid, and returned to find their women with child.  He sang of the repressive institutions they created to assuage bitter jealousy and ensure their paternity, how this only ruined sex for them, and how it passed into Western "civilization." 

I saw in his song how it is the receptive one, the Goddess who must rule sex if it is to be fully sacred, despite his own strength, lust and passion.  Without her deep-heart choice, pleasure is brief and turns to ash (this not being about our genders but about her heart in each of us). 

Then he sang to me about my own feelings, how I assumed sex would be easy for me once I rejected the repressive institutions. 

But love is never easy — it’s too important for that.  I saw I still believed sex is different than friendship, with different rules.  He showed me that sex is always about generosity, intimacy and trust.  Even casual encounters of the kinkiest sort must be mediated by sacred values if they are to satisfy us deeply. 

I wept and wept, I don’t know why, and when I stopped he was gone.  But the rain had passed, and when I stood, I was actually dry.  The sheep paid no attention, patiently cropping the grass in small half-circles. 

2. Song of Survival

Some months later, I was in a foul mood again.  Things had been going better, but I’d just learned from my doctor I had herpes.  Stomping back to work, as I was crossing a little pocket park down town, I encountered a truly foul stench.  I stopped, gagging, and looked around.  Something large must have died.  Then I heard a quiet cackle above me and looking up, spotted him, squatting on his haunches in the tree overhead, holding onto the branch with bird feet, his oversized genitalia dangling obscenely between them.  He was filthy, his thick fur coated in offal. 

"Climb up," he told me, "and I’ll sing you a song."  Climb up — I wasn’t dressed for climbing! But I did it nonetheless.  No one seemed to notice.  Sitting next to him, the smell was so bad I could hardly bear to breathe.  "You don’t like my smell?" I shook my head, no, so as not to have to open my mouth.  He sang. 

He sang again about how sex has evolved to cut through all rules but its own, overcome all forms of disgust, for which we fear it.  Thus, he sang, you have herpes.  You went ahead when you knew the risk.  You knew better. 

No, I protested, it was that or. . . 

Or what? Laughter filled the song.  Humans, he showed me, must neither betray or be betrayed — trust is at the heart of our intimacy.  Protect yourself, he sang to me, and protect your partners. 

Be aware that you may feel like betraying your commitments in the sexual moment because they seem suddenly less important.  This is natural. 

But to betray them is to break a sacred trust and will soil your experience.  This, he sang laughing, is what you humans have intellects for —figure out how to get what you want without harm to yourself or others. 

Yes, you will be tempted to ignore the dangers of disease or agreed-upon limits or your partner’s vulnerabilities in the heat of your arousal.  But instead honor them with your very animal integrity and trust in me that there is always a right path to pleasure. 

"You treat me like a child!" I protested. 

You are all such children, he sang.  Like little children you don’t know how to say yes and no and stop, I’ve changed my mind.  You don’t take good enough care of yourselves or of each other.  You’re all in such a hurry. 

Come pure to sex, not dirty.  Bathe, clean yourself, brush your teeth.  As he showed me, the filth fell away from him, and his stink was replaced by a musky body smell I found quite pleasant

Understand, he sang, that sex is clean and must be protected.  Wash your hands before you touch, more so than with food.  Be reverent.  Take the simple measures you need in order to avoid spreading disease. 

You say you honor me — so act that way!

And there I was, sitting by myself in a tree downtown.  I still had herpes. 

3. Song of Feeling

I was six hours deep in the mountains, hiking by myself.  No one knew where I was.  Fuck them all, perhaps I would die.  But against my will, loneliness and hunger (I hadn’t brought much food) was eroding my sulk.  And now fear was chasing the anger — out of the corner of my eye, I kept seeing something slipping through the trees nearby.  Something large. 

Up ahead I heard water.  I lengthened my stride, being thirsty too.  Cresting a ridge, I came upon a deep, placid pool perhaps thirty feet across into which plunged a perfect little waterfall.  Old trees draped the place with magick.  I felt chills up and down my spine, and a sense of peace. 

Without warning, something huge lunged up from depths and a great dark head broke the surface not ten feet from where I stood.  Terror gripped me, I couldn’t move, everything began to spin.  Only then did I notice his fierce face, the water cascading off his hair and beard. 

Join me, his look commanded. 

I felt hesitant, shy.  I had never been naked in his presence.  I didn’t think I could be, until I realized I’d taken off my clothes and stood there on the bank before him.  Lolling in the pool, he stared at my pathetic body with all its fat and imperfections, too large here, too small there. 

He began to sing. 

I saw myself in the mirror of his eyes and felt how sexy I actually am, even right now, how my body is a lovely instrument of sensuality, perfect for this moment.  I realized that I do have much to offer, as a friend, a lover, a partner, and what I lack are things I have neglected out of fear and cynicism. 

I felt a sudden tearing regret at the hurt I have caused others so as not to be the one hurt.  And also I saw how I’ve betrayed myself to please someone, time after time, and then blamed them and myself for my resulting misery. 

Like a gale in the trees, he sang over and over how

    it is my right and my responsibility
    to choose
    in each moment
    what is right for me
    and what is not. 

Not to take that responsibility, not to exercise that right, is to betray myself. 

And then with gentleness, he also showed me that my silly, boring sex life, with all its failures and self-imposed limitations, is equal to anyone’s on a sacred plane, because sex is less something we do than something we feel. 

I saw that all my complicated emotions, my mixed ecstasy, even my pain, were all of just as grand as those of the uninhibited beautiful people.  To my amazement I understood that in some ways, because sex had been less easy for me than for them, it had been more intense. 

By now, I was floating in the pool beside him, caressed by water on every side. 

I will give you the secret, he sang to me, his face close to mine, this is the secret of sexual success: Four parts pleasure out of every five come from the pleasure of giving, not receiving.  The fifth part is the key to paradise, but never neglect the other four, so safe, easy and so very very sweet.  Have faith in me that you can get if you can give without betraying yourself. 

Floating blissfully there with my eyes shut, I realized that the situation I had been running away from was one where I had been much more concerned with getting than giving, and where more generous goals would have made me less vulnerable to feeling so utterly rejected. 

Opening my eyes, I expected to find him gone, since his song was done.  He was still floating beside me, grinning lazily.  "So," he said, "if I show you a short-cut down the mountain, will you drive home and get on the phone to your lover?"

"I can’t," I said, "you don’t understand." 

But I could. 

(originally published in 2001 in Widdershins volume 7, issue 1).