In Just - e.e cummings, & Death - Emily Dickinson

In e.e cummings poem In Just, I was reminded yet again of the never ending and constantly retold story of the bad guy (in this case the lame and old baloonMan). The baloonMan, I think anyway, is luring in playing youngsters (the word INNOCENT comes to mind here yet again...), by whistling "far and wee". It seems... odd... that a baloonMan would do that, though I myself find balloon people and clowns extremely scary and weird thanks to the movie "It" when I was five yrs. old... And yet in the end, the baloonMan's "goat-footed"-ness is revealed to us. Again! Here is reference to Pan, or satyres, or even Satan himself, in the guise of a baloonman. This is just another story of the Pied Piper, and of Connie and her experiences, and the Demon Lover.

In Dickinson's poem Death, I was instantly reminded of the Greek myth of Demeter and Persephone, at least Iwas reminded of Persephone's point of view. With Hades (aka Death) dragging her down to the underworld to be his queen. Though, in Dickinson's poem, it sounds as if Death is taking her permanently, as if she is dying, and not just going for a trip, that this woman being taken is human. So, in that mind, it could also be a retelling of the Demon Lover, though all of these stories are related to one-another one way or the other, like a lover's triangle.

Why so many retellings???Is it just people's imaginations being inspired by the tales and stories from their youth? I mean, in the end, you can only beat the details and fragments out of something till it's dead.. and then it's done. But is this always true?? Sometimes there seems to be new life w/ every retelling of a story.. and .. in the end.. I think this is the whole reason of the class. To not only to recognize stories for what theyare, but also to understand that these stories, or at least their basework, can be old as dirt itself, and there still seems to be life in them yet, with every version a new author puts out. And with each new version, though very similar to others of the same genre, each story is meant to be interpreted completely differently, and for different reason, just as each was, in a way, written for different reasons. So even though reading all these damsel-in-distress stories may seem redundant, I know deep down that they're all different. . somehow. .