The Sea-Elephant

Trundled from
the strangeness of the sea ---
a kind of
heaven ---

Ladies and Gentlemen!
the greatest
sea-monster ever exhibited
alive

the gigantic sea-elephant! O wallow
of flesh where
are

there fish enough for
that
appetite stupidity
cannot lessen?

Sick
of Aprils smallness
the little
leaves ---

Flesh has lief of you
enormous sea ---
Speak!
Blouaugh! (feed

me) my
flesh is riven ---
fish after fish into his maw
unswallowing

to let them glide down
gulching back
half spittle half
brine

the
trouble eyes --- torn
from the sea.
(In

a practical voice.) They
ought
to put it back where
it came from.

Gape.
Strange head ---
told by old sailors ---
rising

bearded
to the surface --- and
the only
sense out of them

it that woman's
Yes
it's wonderful but they
ought to

put it
back into the sea where
it came from.
Blouaugh!

Swing --- ride
walk
on wires --- toss balls
stoop and

contort yourselves ---
But I
am love. I am
from the sea ---

Blouaugh!
there is no crime save
the too-heavy
body

the sea
held playfully --- comes
to the surface
the water

boiling
about the head the cows
scattering
fish dripping from

the bounty
of . . . . and spring
they say
Spring is icummen in ---

		William Carlos Williams