The Demon Fish Poem by David Lewis Paget

I'd taken my friends way off the shore
In my small, glass-bottomed boat,
The weather was clear, the sea was calm
For the sturdiest boat afloat,
I wanted to scan the hidden depths
Watch all that lived on the reef,
But Peter my friend, just wanted to fish,
And so did his brother, Keith.

They busied themselves with their fishing rods,
Were bent on baiting their hooks,
When suddenly something beneath the boat
Made me take a second look,
It only appeared a shadow at first
Came on with a sinuous glide,
It wasn't a fish I had seen before,
‘Hey, just look at this, ' I cried.

They both turned around and peered below
But then the shadow had gone,
‘What did you see, ' said Peter P.
‘It must have been twenty feet long! '
‘Oh rubbish, ' said Keith, ‘beyond belief,
There isn't a fish of that size,
Not even the great White Pointer Shark,
You must have mud in your eyes.'

‘I know what I saw, ' I said again,
‘It had the most horrible teeth,
It seemed to be looking for prey down there
Across the top of the reef.'
‘I've fished these waters for twenty years,
I think I'd have seen it by now, '
Said Peter P. with a smirk at me,
‘Watch us, and we'll show you how.'

They knew I wasn't a fisherman,
I wouldn't know Cod from a shark,
I just liked to watch the fishes swim
Through the glass-bottomed boat in the dark,
I'd rigged up floodlights to light below
That eerie, mysterious deep,
Where seaweed swayed in the land they played
With the rest of the world asleep.

The guys continued and cast their lines,
While I sat reading a book,
We'd be there hours, and that was fine
I took the occasional look,
We drifted over a patch of blue
The sand was clear below,
When back there came that sinuous shape
I said to the guys, ‘HeLLO! '

This time it headed up for the boat,
Less like a fish than a snake,
A massive head with reptilian teeth
And suddenly I was awake.
It shot straight up, right over the boat
Snapping its massive jaw,
And took Keith's arm from his shoulder blades
Right into its mighty maw.

We just couldn't stop the flow of blood
It filled the boat as he died,
And Peter P. was distraught as he
Sat helplessly, and he cried.
‘That must be some prehistoric beast
That lived on the ocean floor,
I'll never go fishing again, ' said he
As we headed back to the shore.

27 December 2016