He lurks among the reeds, beside the marsh,
Red oleanders twisted in His hair,
His eyes are haggard and His lips are harsh,
Upon His breast the bones show gaunt and bare.
The green and stagnant waters lick His feet,
And from their filmy, iridescent scum
Clouds of mosquitoes, gauzy in the heat,
Rise with His gifts: Death and Delirium.
His messengers: They bear the deadly taint
On spangled wings aloft and far away,
Making thin music, strident and yet faint,
From golden eve to silver break of day.
The baffled sleeper hears th’ incessant whine
Through his tormented dreams, and finds no rest
The thirsty insects use his blood for wine,
Probe his blue veins and pasture on his breast.
While far away He in the marshes lies,
Staining the stagnant water with His breath,
An endless hunger burning in His eyes,
A famine unassuaged, whose food is Death.
He hides among the ghostly mists that float
Over the water, weird and white and chill,
And peasants, passing in their laden boat,
Shiver and feel a sense of coming ill.
A thousand burn and die; He takes no heed,
Their bones, unburied, strewn upon the plain,
Only increase the frenzy of His greed
To add more victims to th’ already slain.
He loves the haggard frame, the shattered mind,
Gloats with delight upon the glazing eye,
Yet, in one thing, His cruelty is kind,
He sends them lovely dreams before they die;
Dreams that bestow on them their heart’s desire,
Visions that find them mad, and leave them blest,
To sink, forgetful of the fever’s fire,
Softly, as in a lover’s arms, to rest.
A few random poems:
- Full Fathom Five by Sylvia Plath
- Robert Burns: My Collier Laddie:
- word of God by Raj Arumugam
- At the Mid Hour of Night by Thomas Moore
- What a Glow Everywhere I see – Aaj Rung Hai poem – with a translation Amir Khusro poems | Poems and Poetry
- Aplolgia Pro Vita Sua by Samuel Coleridge
- Of course I love you by Sappho
- Алексей Толстой – Тебя так любят все
- Honor Among Scamps by Vachel Lindsay
- Владимир Маяковский – Вам нравится есть?.. (РОСТА №528)
- We Are To Play The Game Of Death by Rabindranath Tagore
- Владимир Маяковский – Совет Труда и Обороны сделал ассигнование миллионное… ( Главполитпросвет №64)
- To The Right Honourable William, Earl Of Dartmouth, His Majesty’s Principal Secretary Of The State For North-America, by Phillis Wheatley
- Robert Burns: Complimentary Epigram On Maria Riddell:
- Василий Жуковский – К ней
External links
Bat’s Poetry Page – more poetry by Fledermaus
Talking Writing Monster’s Page –
Batty Writing – the bat’s idle chatter, thoughts, ideas and observations, all original, all fresh
Poems in English
- The Match poem – Andrew Marvell poems
- The Mower Against Gardens poem – Andrew Marvell poems
- The Garden poem – Andrew Marvell poems
- The Gallery poem – Andrew Marvell poems
- The First Anniversary Of The Government Under O.C. poem – Andrew Marvell poems
- The Fair Singer poem – Andrew Marvell poems
- The Death of Cromwell poem – Andrew Marvell poems
- The Coronet poem – Andrew Marvell poems
- The Character Of Holland poem – Andrew Marvell poems
- Senec. Traged. Ex Thyeste Chor.2 poem – Andrew Marvell poems
- Ros poem – Andrew Marvell poems
- On The Victory Obtained By Blake Over the Spaniards, In The Bay Of Scanctacruze, In The Island Of teneriff.1657 poem – Andrew Marvell poems
- On Mr. Milton’s Paradise Lost poem – Andrew Marvell poems
- On A Drop Of Dew poem – Andrew Marvell poems
- Mourning poem – Andrew Marvell poems
- Music’s Empire poem – Andrew Marvell poems
- Last Instructions to a Painter poem – Andrew Marvell poems
- In Effigiem Oliveri Cromwell poem – Andrew Marvell poems
- Hortus poem – Andrew Marvell poems
- Fleckno, an English Priest at Rome poem – Andrew Marvell poems
More external links (open in a new tab):
Doska or the Board – write anything
Search engines:
Yandex – the best search engine for searches in Russian (and the best overall image search engine, in any language, anywhere)
Qwant – the best search engine for searches in French, German as well as Romance and Germanic languages.
Ecosia – a search engine that supposedly… plants trees
Duckduckgo – the real alternative and a search engine that actually works. Without much censorship or partisan politics.
Yahoo– yes, it’s still around, amazingly, miraculously, incredibly, but now it seems to be powered by Bing.
Parallel Translations of Poetry
The Poetry Repository – an online library of poems, poetry, verse and poetic works

Violet Nicolson ( 1865 – 1904); otherwise known as Adela Florence Nicolson (née Cory), was an English poetess who wrote under the pseudonym of Laurence Hope, however she became known as Violet Nicolson. In the early 1900s, she became a best-selling author. She committed suicide and is buried in Madras, now Chennai, India.