🐐 Pan—

Maybe from paon, "to pasture" — reeking of goat, hooves in the mud. Or from pan-, "all," like panoply, pandemic, pantheon. Probably both.

He gives us panic. Panikon — the fear that arrives in an open field at noon with no visible cause. The sudden sense that everything is awake.

And pandemonium. All the demons.

The same prefix shows up in calmer places. Pantheon: all the gods, seated under a roof. Panoply: everything polished and arranged. Panorama: the whole tableau.

The Olympians are gods of status. Everything in its proper place. Sky, sea, underworld. Bins. Buckets. Clean edges. Pan is older than edges. Older than hierarchy. The brush growing back between the stones. The sound the wind makes.

The pasture. The field that doesn't end.