1 “Look, any hope [of capturing him] is futile —
one would fall prostrate at the very sight of him.
2 No one is fierce enough to rouse him,
so who can stand up to me?
3 Who has given me anything
and made me pay it back?
Everything belongs to me
under all of heaven.
4 “I have more to say about his limbs,
his strong talk, and his matchless strength.
5 Who can strip off his [scaly] garment?
Who can enter his jaws?
6 Who can pry open the doors of his face,
so close to his terrible teeth?
7 “His pride is his rows of scales,
tightly sealed together —
8 one is so close to the next
that no air can come between them;
9 they are stuck one to another,
interlocked and impervious.
10 “When he sneezes, light flashes out;
his eyes are like the shimmer of dawn.
11 From his mouth go fiery torches,
and sparks come flying out.
12 His nostrils belch steam
like a caldron boiling on the fire.
13 His breath sets coals ablaze;
flames pour from his mouth.
14 “Strength resides in his neck,
and dismay dances ahead of him [as he goes].
15 The layers of his flesh stick together;
they are firm on him, immovable.
16 His heart is as hard as a stone,
yes, hard as a lower millstone.
17 When he rears himself up, the gods are afraid,
beside themselves in despair.
18 “If a sword touches him, it won’t stick;
neither will a spear, or a dart, or a lance.
19 He regards iron as straw
and bronze as rotten wood.
20 An arrow can’t make him flee;
for him, slingstones are so much chaff.
21 Clubs count as hay,
and he laughs at a quivering javelin.
22 His belly is as sharp as fragments of pottery,
so he moves across the mud like a threshing-sledge.
23 “He makes the depths seethe like a pot,
he makes the sea [boil] like a perfume kettle.
24 He leaves a shining wake behind him,
making the deep seem to have white hair.
25 “On earth there is nothing like him,
a creature without fear.
26 He looks straight at all high things.
He is king over all proud beasts.”