Knight Vanquishing Time, Death, and Monstrous Demons (Philips Wouwerman), Sonnet #290

The hourglass-helmed soldier with a pike
Stabs the fetlocks of the knight's white stallion.
That motherless bastard will always strike
From behind. His eye a peeling onion,
His heart and lungs a single ganglion,
He's more fearful than a death or demon.
The knight takes on all enemies, evil
Or not -- even the ovum and semen
Embedded in the bones of the just dead.
The crown an angel holds bears his free will,
Though he would sooner wear Time's severed head.
When all is vanquished and night descends,
The corpses rise -- spinning slowly, spinning still.
With nothing left to slay, the knight's life ends.

Knight, Death, and the Devil (Durer)

#79

The Knight and his Death ride horses bridled;
One with studded leather, the Other twisted hemp.
The Devil walks. Having nothing hasty to attempt,
He's happiest when men, actively morally idle,
March, run, ride, or fly toward anything Ideal.
Plodding along, He's never too far behind.
The Devil and Death have nothing to conceal
From a Knight known to be uncommonly kind;
To the men who've just been maimed by his sword,
He's always spared a righteous, comforting word.
They show themselves: anthropomorphic Fates
The Knight, smiling to himself, politely ignores.
A running dog briefly disrupts the stalemate
Only one of the three has the power to restore.