Dank dulse, and rushing waters cold; Eternal signs of shadowed night Beyond the zephyr-haunted space Of adequate lees 'neath the sky: Unfathomed haunts of stark souls bold That squat on waves of darkest dight, Malignly mute as foam-waves race To pyres where men in torture lie. When thrones are levelled to the dust, And glories fade in cauldrons tossed, 'Mid waters vaster than the night In scarlet tombs that rasp grim Death, Supernal selves, loosed from king Lust As Dissolution bulwarks crossed, Conviction of an undreamt might Assail each mongrel afrite's breath. Hushed gasps permeate the solemn air As coral Twilight flaunts its sheen, And vapours wreath phantastic forms Till vaulted domes glow like the noon. Vague dreams plague souls beyond repair, Phantoms, black demons call their queen, Skinks and owls whom no conscience storms Make faces at the leprous moon. And bleak dungeons dank with odours Strong, within each encrusted gyre, 'Mid treasure-vaults digged by gray Age, Affronting witches incense burn; And howling ghouls gape thro' vapours, Two siffling vampyres dance on fire, Each mottled sage a conqueréd page To him whose hate no Doom can turn, No bat-faced gnome can stem the blaze: Hence harlots, ghastly with giant sin, Chant runes to him in strobic gloom As figgum's plied before his throne. Malignly mute, he peers thro' haze; Infernal pæons shake each Inn, Blue lights 'twixt opals burn and bloom In deep-hued haunts of Typhon's home. In vain we seek an isle of peace Beyond the pale of siffling Doom! 'Mid stillness vaster than the tomb, Made equal with the ghouls who lurk On battlements where witches ease Their minds as rubic censers fume, A Fiend bubbles in ruddy bloom As turgid dyes the night-dwales shirk. No sunsets crimson this stainéd sea, No Ev'ntides her plume unfolds; An opaque light that Silence wrought. Careens thro' space in quest of toll. Then demons storm each sea and lee, Abhorrent sights each Cauldron holds, Dim shapes flit to the distant ghaut Where Doom sits poised--Each monster's goal! Erelong the air shakes with a roar-- Forebodings of souls on Death's dome! Bright cyphers spell the new-damnéd name In letters 'gainst a leprous home: Oaths peel like the hammer of Thor-- The screaming thing is flayed to bone! Its sins--an outraged Body's shame-- Laid bare as whipcords dye the foam, Whereon nepheloid imps and night, Soom on with tidings of a moan, Of dews, and whisper'd groans and sighs. And, as vague forms writhe in despair, A native in phantastic dight Stills Torture's hold in weazened tone, Black incense lifts its wand and flies To haunts where mattoids rave and swear.