The Kraken

by Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Below the thunders of the upper deep,
Far, far beneath in the abysmal sea,
His ancient, dreamless, uninvaded sleep
The Kraken sleepeth: faintest sunlights flee
About his shadowy sides; above him swell
Huge sponges of millennial growth and height;
And far away into the sickly light,
From many a wondrous and secret cell
Unnumbered and enormous polypi
Winnow with giant fins the slumbering green.
There hath he lain for ages, and will lie
Battening upon huge sea-worms in his sleep,
Until the latter fire shall heat the deep;
Then once by man and angels to be seen,
In roaring he shall rise and on the surface die.

* * *

Furor likes this one, so maybe he could explain it better than I. It seems like a sonnet, but its rhyme scheme is unusual, as though Tennyson couldn't quite decide whether to make it Shakespearean or Petrarchan. It has a very deep (no pun intended) tone, like Ulmo's trumpets, if you've read The Silmarillion. The deep secret places of the sea are, scientists and poets tell us alike, more of a mystery than the surface of the moon.

It also reminds me of Lepanto:

They rise in green robes roaring from the green hells of the sea
Where fallen skies and evil hues and eyeless creatures be,
On them the sea-valves cluster and the grey sea-forests curl,
Splashed with a splendid sickness, the sickness of the pearl.

And the reference to the end of the world, when all these things shall be laid bare, puts a perfect closure on the poem, too.