NIMROUD was a hunter, striding A belated mastodon; Forests where he took his riding Lay like corn when night came on. Nimroud slid beneath the table After seven vats of drink: When he rose he builded Babel Tottering on heaven's brink. Babel fell in storm, but Nimroud Went to sleep among his vats, Where his body hid a dim rood, Drawing down a plague of gnats. By his elemental snoring Baffled gnats swirled in his nose; Thick ones up his brain crept boring, Where their bodies swelled and rose. Such his pain and such his clamour That an Ethiop grey from fears With a giant's wooden hammer Beat his head four hundred years. On his eagle's-breast-filled pallet Nimroud swore that he was god ('Twixt the wearings of the mallet) Tressed with life, with deep death shod. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...SONNET: WRITTEN ON THE DAY THAT MR. LEIGH HUNT LEFT PRISON by JOHN KEATS OF THE REED THAT THE JEWS SET IN OUR SAVIOUR'S HAND by WILLIAM ALABASTER NEW YORK CITY by MAXWELL BODENHEIM THE LAST RIDE TOGETHER by ROBERT BROWNING AN INDIAN AT THE BURIAL PLACE OF HIS FATHERS by WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT |