Comedy
Lo! 'tis a gala night Within the lonesome latter years!An angel throng, bewinged, bedight In veils, and drowned in tears,Sit in a theatre, to see A play of hopes and fears,While the orchestra breathes fitfully The music of the spheres.Mimes, in the form of God on high, Mutter and mumble low,And hither and thither fly- Mere puppets they, who come and goAt bidding of vast formless things That shift the scenery to and fro,Flapping from out their Condor wings Invisible Woe!That motley drama- oh, be sure It shall not be forgot!With its Phantom chased for evermore, By a crowd that seize it not,Through a circle that ever returneth in To the self-same spot,And much of Madness, and more of Sin, And Horror the soul of the plot.But see, amid the mimic rout A crawling shape intrude!A blood-red thing that writhes from out The scenic solitude!It writhes!- it writhes!- with mortal pangs The mimes become its food,And seraphs sob at vermin fangs In human gore imbued.Out- out are the lights- out all! And, over each quivering form,The curtain, a funeral pall, Comes down with the rush of a storm,While the angels, all pallid and wan, Uprising, unveiling, affirmThat the play is the tragedy, "Man," And its hero the Conqueror Worm.