Last of the Undersea Dragons

The sea is replete with the briny tears I’ve shed,
which pour from my cave on the ocean bed.

I’m bound with pungent seaweed like manacles
and studded with tenacious barnacles.

When thunderstorms set the waves a-rocking,
I rise to the surface, where fork lightning

illuminates my scales of bladder wrack green
and coral pink – however they’re never seen

because I am mateless and childless,
alone in my watery world, the last of my species,

waiting for the sun to penetrate the gloom;
waiting to be discovered – or meet my doom.

Kim M. Russell, 19th November 2024

Image by Tiraya Adam on Unsplash

Today I’m hosting Poetics at the dVerse Poets Pub, and we are writing about those legendary creatures – dragons.

We are looking at dragons in different ways: as menacing, violent creatures that must be defeated; as a source of wisdom; as protectors of the innocent; as treasure guardians; as metaphors for internal struggles; or as friendly, magical creatures, inspiring wonder and awe.

I threw down my gauntlet with a challenge to write a poem about a dragon, and accepted it!

45 thoughts on “Last of the Undersea Dragons”

  1. A mournful tale of the last of a dragon race. I love how you’ve beautifully imagined her, Kim, when in the storm she rises her on the waves,

    “where fork lightning

    illuminates my scales of bladder wrack green
    and coral pink” — I can see it happening as you’ve conveyed it so brilliantly.

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  4. When your words wander to the sea in your poetry emotions always come alive! So very visual, like a dramatic painting, but yes, the emotion here is really there, poignantly so in fact, within the dramatic landscape. A tour de force which makes for a kind of read that one does in front of a large painting, with the added sentiment after a film with in-depth portrayals.

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    1. We know less about what’s under the sea than anywhere else on Earth. There’s a chance that the Loch Ness monster is a kind of dragon. I would love for them to exist. And what happened to griffins?

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  9. Your dragon is another of the Old Ones of the sea — there’s Glaucus, the Ancient Mariner, the ghost ship — but we’re in the age of the last of the beasts and their mythic animal existence. Love the descriptions of the dragon’s long sea-life and her colors — like a thing hauled up rom the deep. So lonely and sad, too.

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  11. Kim this is amazing! Such vibrant imagery, and like the sea so deep. The longing to be discovered hit me, and reminds me of a Rumi quote, something like that which I am seeking, is also seeking me. I agree with Brendan also

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