I need a riddle for which I already have the answer...

[Prince of Happiness]

My bed is gold
My skin is steel
My teeth are sharp
I am a dragon
What am I?

 

[kirinke]

I am the breath of shadow, the hint of light and the darkest night.
My bed is the sun, my pillow the moon.
I bring the rain, I bring the fire.
I am fear realized and hope undreamt.
I am death. I am life.
I have been here before time.
I fear not the bee's sting nor the lightening's cruel bite.

What am I?

 

[Kafkonia]

Wrong question if you are referring to 42, the answer to life, the universe and everything. The question that goes along with THAT answer is, "What is six times nine?"

Yes, I know it doesn't come out to 42, that's why it was funny.

Ah, but 6x9 does equal 42 in base 13 (triskedecimal?)

 

[Slife]

Ah, but 6x9 does equal 42 in base 13 (triskedecimal?)

Yes, but nobody makes jokes in base 13

 

[Christian]

Does anyone have a riddle where the answer is "A Dragon"?

"What have I got in my pocket? GAAAAHHHH!"

 

[Celebrim]

Wrong question if you are referring to 42, the answer to life, the universe and everything. The question that goes along with THAT answer is, "What is six times nine?"

Yes, I know it doesn't come out to 42, that's why it was funny.

Arrrrrrgggggghhhhh....

So many people have this misconception.

This is the real story.

The Earth was destroyed just before the question was produced. We know that Arthur Dent supposedly had the question written into his brain and if he had allowed himself to be dissected that its very probable that the question would have been discovered.

When Arthur Dent hears the story of the question, he says the question could be anything and offers as an example, "What is six times seven?"

Later, when Arthur is deposited in Earth's past, he attempts to obtain the answer to the question from the primitive earthlings inhabiting the planet. They produce the question, "What is six times nine?" Arthur theorizes that the arrival of the Golgafrinchans have upset the program, causing the Earth to produce the wrong answer. We are led from this to assume that the real question is something similar to "What is six times nine.", but the end of it has been corrupted in much the same way the end of the Earth's program is corrupted by the Galgafrinchans.

Which leads us back to the one sensible answer to the question an Earthman has ever given - "What is six times seven?"

And that question is funny for much the same reason that '42' is a funny answer to "What is the meaning of Life, the Universe, and Everything?"

But, its also suggestive that Douglas Adams likes numerology, and that he intends to pose for us a numerological puzzle - very similar in my opinion to the numerological puzzle posed by John the Revelator when he says that the anti-christ can be recognized by the number of the beast, or 666. The question then becomes, besides being funny, how serious was Douglas Adams being? Much of his other funny commentary in Hitchhiker's also works on multiple levels, why wouldn't the obviously intellectual Adams encode something in his seemingly meaningless statement that the answer to life, the universe, and everything is "42".

Or maybe the joke is watching people over analyze his silliness.

 

[Celebrim]

If I may be so bold as to revise...

The clouds bring rain,
But the crops are scorched
The sun brings light,
But the skies are darkened
The air sleeps on winter's night,
But my wrath brings a storm
The mountain is great,
But nothing is my peer
The cave is dark,
But I am darker
The gold is bright,
But I am brighter
Neither time nor battle do I fear

Consider it an open source riddle. Feel free to use, modify or distribute.

I was writing in haste from work. Some of your changes I like, some not so much. The last line changing from 'nothing' to 'battle' I heartily endorse. The additional line of 'the mountain is great' is my least favorite addition.

Addendum: I read right over the top of this the first time, but if you change the first line to 'the clouds bring rain', and the third line to 'the sun brings light', you destroy the riddle.

Let me explain. The crops are scorched because it is a rain of fire, that the 'river' brings. Dragons, being sinuous, are poetic allusions to rivers, and vica versa. The sun is darkened by the same thing that brings light to the sky.

The first few lines correctly translate to, "I am the long sinuous thing which brings a rain of fire. I am the fiery thing that blots out the sun."

 

[Celebrim]

I am the breath of shadow, the hint of light and the darkest night.
My bed is the sun, my pillow the moon.
I bring the rain, I bring the fire.
I am fear realized and hope undreamt.
I am death. I am life.
I have been here before time.
I fear not the bee's sting nor the lightening's cruel bite.

What am I?

A Coatl.

I tried to avoid creating a riddle that only worked for a certain mythology.

 

[kirinke]

Hmmm. I wasn't exactly going for Coatl. But If you think about it, dragons are everything listed in the poem or have been at one point or another in all mythologies.

 

[Celebrim]

Hmmm. I wasn't exactly going for Coatl. But If you think about it, dragons are everything listed in the poem or have been at one point or another in all mythologies.

I agree. And a Coatl is little more than the central american version of the dragon.

But I thought your poetics more fitting to a D&D coatl than to a D&D dragon (although I did like your poetic for a bed of silver and gold. Very classy classical riddling there), and was generally brought in mind of a divine creature. For example, you wouldn't in your average D&D mythology refer to a dragon as having been here since before time.