Hard by the lilied Nile I saw A duskish-dragon stretched along, The brown habergeon of his limbs enameled With sanguine almandines and rainy pearl: And on his back there lay a young one sleeping, No bigger than a mouse; with eyes like beads, And a small fragment of its speckled egg Remaining on its harmless, pulpy snout; A thing to laugh at, as it gaped to catch The baulking merry flies. In the iron jaws Of the great devil-beast, like a pale soul Fluttering in rocky hell, lightsomely flew A snowy trochilus, wotj roseate beak Tearing the hairy leeches from his throat. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE WHITE CASCADE by WILLIAM HENRY DAVIES ALMANZOR & ALMAHIDE, OR THE CONQUEST OF GRANADA: PART 2. EPILOGUE by JOHN DRYDEN A PRAISE OF HIS LOVE by HENRY HOWARD THE VOW OF WASHINGTON by JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER WRITTEN ON THE LEAVES OF A FAN by FRANCIS ATTERBURY UNCROWNED by ALFRED GOLDSWORTHY BAILEY |