The silence of English poets on the subject of insects as compared with Japanese poets is due to general causes that we shall consider at the close of the lecture.
Common flies could scarcely seem to be a subject for poetry--disgusting and annoying creatures as they are.

But there are more poems about the house-fly than about the dragon-fly.

Last year I quoted for you a remarkable and rather mystical composition by the poet Blake about accidentally killing a fly.

Blake represents his own thoughts about the brevity of human life which had been aroused by the incident.

It is charming little poem; but it does not describe the fly at all.