When the World Is Mud-Luscious

E. H. Shepard, “Christopher Robin”

Thursday

To welcome in spring—and to feel better about the miserable rainy day that we had yesterday—here’s one of my favorite seasonal poems. In his characteristic way, e. e. cummings plays with spacing, punctuation, and word placement to give a sense of the season exploding like joyous children. The goat-footed balloon man is a Pan figure, spring-like in the way that he ushers in bright colors.

No too many children were running around outside yesterday, the first day of spring. But mud-luscious was definitely the order of the day.

in Just-
spring          when the world is mud-
luscious the little
lame balloonman

whistles          far          and wee

and eddieandbill come
running from marbles and
piracies and it’s
spring

when the world is puddle-wonderful

the queer
old balloonman whistles
far          and             wee
and bettyandisbel come dancing

from hop-scotch and jump-rope and

it’s
spring
and

         the

                  goat-footed

balloonMan          whistles
far
and
wee

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