ODE ON A FLEA.
“A lofty theme,
Fit subject for the noblest bard
That ever strung a lyre.”
—Coleridge.
Insufferable pest! that with wondrous force
Sinks in my quivering flesh thy noxious tooth,
To tap life’s current in its healthful course,
And break my needful rest, and bring me ruth.
Oh! virulent marauder, thou art a bore in truth,
And who, that smarts beneath thy awful bite,
And poisonous delving, but will, forsooth,
Think that sage poet may have erred a mite,
Who ably sang in ages past, “Whatever is, is right.”
I’ll place thee foremost in the swarm of those
Tormenting insects that plague mankind;
Yet greater craven from the earth ne’er rose,
Than thou, mute robber of my peace of mind.
In the musical mosquito noble traits we find;
When he at night upon his mission goes,
And quits the ceiling where he long has pined,
On his shrill bugle a lusty blast he blows,
To warn his drowsy prey that a raid he doth propose.
The vampire bat of Southern latitudes,
That preys at night upon the throat of man,
Quite conscious of the pain his tooth intrudes,
Doth with membraneous wings the victim fan,
To hold him still unconscious if he can,
Of the dark demon hovering o’er his head,
Drawing the blood from visage cold and wan,
Till fully gorged it leaves the sleeper’s bed,
And he, awaking, scarce believes he has been freely bled.
But thou, black delver, what virtue canst thou claim?
Save great activity, which makes me hate thee more.
Through night and day thy laboring is the same,
Insatiate ever, thou never wilt give o’er,
But glutton-like, still sap and bite, and bore.
Yet truly thou art cursed in having such a jaw,
The champ of which doth try my patience sore.
And soon thou hast to scud from angry scratch and claw,
And often thou must bite afresh ere surfeited thy maw!
Hadst thou instead of escharotic teeth
Been furnished with a blood-extracting bill,
Which once insinuated skin beneath,
The worst were past; I’d feel no thrill
To make me shiver as though an ague chill
Did all my joints and nerves undo,
Till I sit chattering like a fanning mill,
Perhaps when sitting in the still church pew,
Where I should think of heaven instead of things like you.
I grant there’s naught on earth, nor in the sea,
Nor in the windy waste around our rolling sphere,
That can at all compare with thy agility
When thou art taken with a sense of fear.
And what was ever formed that can come near
Thy well-knit bones? Thy strange infrangibility
Is too well known to need long mention here,
For who but oft has seen thee spring away quite free,
Although between the fingers rolled most spitefully.