GREEN growths of mosses drop and bead Around the granite brink; And 'twixt the isles of water-weed The wood-birds dip and drink. Slow efts about the edges sleep; Swift-darting water-flies Shoot on the surface; down the deep Fast-following bubbles rise. Look down. What groves that scarcely sway! What 'wood obscure,' profound! What jungle! -- where some beast of prey Might choose his vantage-ground! Who knows what lurks beneath the tide? -- Who knows what tale? Belike, Those 'antres vast' and shadows hide Some patriarchal Pike; -- Some tough old tyrant, wrinkle-jawed, To whom the sky, the earth, Have but for aim to look on awed And see him wax in girth; -- Hard ruler there by right of might; An ageless Autocrat, Whose 'good old rule' is 'Appetite, And subjects fresh and fat;' -- While they -- poor souls! -- in wan despair Still watch for signs in him; And dying, hand from heir to heir The day undawned and dim, When the pond's terror too must go; Or creeping in by stealth, Some bolder brood, with common blow, Shall found a Commonwealth. Or say, -- perchance the liker this! -- That these themselves are gone; That Amurath in minimis, -- Still hungry, -- lingers on, With dwindling trunk and wolfish jaw Revolving sullen things, But most the blind unequal law That rules the food of Kings; -- The blot that makes the cosmic All A mere time-honoured cheat; -- That bids the Great to eat the Small, Yet lack the Small to eat! Who knows! Meanwhile the mosses bead Around the granite brink; And 'twixt the isles of water-weed The wood-birds dip and drink. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...A HOLIDAY by LIZETTE WOODWORTH REESE FRIENDSHIP [OR, THE TRUE FRIEND] by WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE THE PRELUDE: BOOK 1. CHILDHOOD AND SCHOOL-TIME by WILLIAM WORDSWORTH LET ME FORGET by OMA CARLYLE ANDERSON FAREWELL TO THE PILGRIMS by THEODORE M. BAKKE INTO THE SALIENT by EDMUND CHARLES BLUNDEN CROSS AND THRONE by HORATIO (HORATIUS) BONAR |