March Flies
Clarence Michael James Stanislaus Dennis 1876 (Auburn) – 1938 (Melbourne)
Now comes the time when we douse flies
With various kinds of sprays
The sand flies, and the house flies,
And the flies with furtive ways.
But I keep my hate for the large flies
That come for the tree-lined creek
Those arch flies, the March flies
With a crosscut saw for a beak.
Now, most flies rouse in the autumn
From the summer's drowsy daze,
And they bite as nature taught 'em,
In various styles and ways.
They nip, or they stab or they burrow;
But the fly that knocks me out
Is the March fly, with the dull, dead eye
And a crosscut saw for a snout.
Now the house flies come to the table
Or busily play on the pane;
And our rage and heat they calmly treat
With the uttermost disdain.
And the buzz-flies buzz and blunder,
And the sandflies dig right in;
But my whole soul shrinks when the March fly sinks
His crosscut under my skin.
He's a sneak and an arrant coward,
And the lowest of low-down cows,
By nature ghoulishly dowered
With a weapon no law allows.
And it isn't the pain he gives me
Nor the blood he may chance to draw,
It's the loathsome way that he makes foul play
With his really terrible,
Most unbearable,
Horrible crosscut saw.
Font size:
Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 1:07 min read
- 56 Views
Quick analysis:
Scheme | ABABACAC XBXBXDXD EFXFXGXG XHDHXIXEEI |
---|---|
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 1,121 |
Words | 221 |
Stanzas | 4 |
Stanza Lengths | 8, 8, 8, 10 |
Translation
Find a translation for this poem in other languages:
Select another language:
- - Select -
- 简体中文 (Chinese - Simplified)
- 繁體中文 (Chinese - Traditional)
- Español (Spanish)
- Esperanto (Esperanto)
- 日本語 (Japanese)
- Português (Portuguese)
- Deutsch (German)
- العربية (Arabic)
- Français (French)
- Русский (Russian)
- ಕನ್ನಡ (Kannada)
- 한국어 (Korean)
- עברית (Hebrew)
- Gaeilge (Irish)
- Українська (Ukrainian)
- اردو (Urdu)
- Magyar (Hungarian)
- मानक हिन्दी (Hindi)
- Indonesia (Indonesian)
- Italiano (Italian)
- தமிழ் (Tamil)
- Türkçe (Turkish)
- తెలుగు (Telugu)
- ภาษาไทย (Thai)
- Tiếng Việt (Vietnamese)
- Čeština (Czech)
- Polski (Polish)
- Bahasa Indonesia (Indonesian)
- Românește (Romanian)
- Nederlands (Dutch)
- Ελληνικά (Greek)
- Latinum (Latin)
- Svenska (Swedish)
- Dansk (Danish)
- Suomi (Finnish)
- فارسی (Persian)
- ייִדיש (Yiddish)
- հայերեն (Armenian)
- Norsk (Norwegian)
- English (English)
Citation
Use the citation below to add this poem to your bibliography:
Style:MLAChicagoAPA
"March Flies" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 19 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem/6447/march-flies>.
Discuss the poem March Flies with the community...
Report Comment
We're doing our best to make sure our content is useful, accurate and safe.
If by any chance you spot an inappropriate comment while navigating through our website please use this form to let us know, and we'll take care of it shortly.
Attachment
You need to be logged in to favorite.
Log In