Giant and the star : little annals in rhyme / by Madison Cawein [electronic text]

OLD SNAKE-DOCTOR

I

ONCE I found an ant-lion's hole And an ant-lion in it: nippers Like a pair of rusty clippers. And I saw a red ant roll In its pit, and, quick as Ned, This old ant-lion fanged its head,Held it till the ant was dead.

II

And I told my father: he Smiled and said, "He beats the dickens, With his pinchers; even chickens Have n't his voracity. — Think now what he would have done Had you been an ant, my son, Fallen in that pit like one.

III

"Daniel in the lion's den! — Guess you'd come home good and gory. But now here's another story: —You should see these ant-lions when

They have wings; and, blue and green, Ponds and pools they fly between: Prettiest things I've ever seen.

IV

"Look just like the dragonflies; And perhaps they are snake-feeders; Name you'll never find in Readers Read at school: but, I surmise, Dragonflies are not the same As these old snake-doctors; name For which I am not to blame.

V

"Who's to blame then? If it's not I or, say, the dictionary, — Since we two seem so contráry, — Must be that old ant-lion what Can't content itself, that's plain, With its bug-estate; remain Just a bug in sun and rain.

VI

"Has to get himself new clothes! Gauzy wings that shine and glitter; Something that he thinks is fitter His profession, I suppose,

Doctoring things, like water-snakes; Finery that often takes Eyes of hungry ducks and drakes:

VII

"And of fishes, too, the fool. Who his coat so bright and brassy, Mirrored in the waters glassy, Leap for, drag into the pool. — Old snake-doctor, flaunt your fill! Feed the snakes or cure or kill — In the end you pay the bill."