(inspired by the work of Edgar Allen Poe)



I. Red Death

It was a time when life was short

Long devastated was the land

Never had there ever been

A more fatal plague against all man

Pungent pain, sudden faintness

Your energy begins to fade

As you stand there somewhat daunted

You know 'Red Death' is on it's way

Blood, blood, blood and more blood

Profuse bleeding at the pores

You watch your blood slowly sizzle

As your flesh dissolves some more

Screams of anguish, blood still flowing

Pollutes the ground a rotten red

Your time has come, you must meet your maker

As you slip into the valley of the shadow of death



II. The Prince's Master Plan

All men feared this great disaster

But the valiant Prince had the only answer

For his majesty and his chosen ones

The inception of new life would free them of contagion

Magnificent it was this structure of seclusion

Surrounded by these walls so massive yet elusive

The gates were welded shut impervious to those forsaken

Never letting go of the souls that were taken

There was beauty, there was wine

Ambrosia and sweet nectar

Flowing from within

All appliances of pleasure

Inside the Master-Plan

Providing noble lunacy

Outside the palace gates

'Red Death' just sits and waits for you



Narration:

It was toward the close of the fifth or

sixth month of his seclusion, and while the

pestilence raged most furiously abroad, that

the Prince Prospreo entertained his thousand

friends at a masked ball of the most unusual

magnificence... Edgar Allen Poe (1809-1849)



III. The Masquerade including the Twelfth Hour and Return of the Red Death

Bizzare it was seven chambers

Held this jubilee except for one

It stood alone, the western wing

Where no one shared it's offerings

Blood tinted panes, brazier or fire

Projects it's rays

A clock stands tall, ominous

It warns of death so soon to be

So loud, so deep the guests pay heed

The dissonant ring of ebony

The crowd goes pale as darkness

Shrouds the maskers in their revelry

Then as the echos ceased

A light laughter spread through the assembly

And all is well

Until the next chiming of old ebony



The ebony clock struck the twelfth hour

And everyting ceased as the revellers cowered

The pendulum swings all still, all silent

Save the voice of old ebony

As the last chime died and sunk into silence

Soon it was felt a presence so strange

Tall and gaunt who is this masked figure

Shrouded in habiliments of the grave?

His blood splattered mask bore a striking resemblence

The countenance of a rigid corpse

He stalked to and fro in a slow, solemn movement

Enraging the Duke, invasion of his sanctuary

'Seize him, unmask him, ' commanded the prince

'Who dares insult us with this blasphemous mockery?

You'll hang at sunrise! '

Not a person came forth it seemed like all was lost

As the intruder make his way unimpeded

An anon he went on trugged through each chamber

Where the music once swelled and the dreams lived on and on

The prince in pursuit dagger drawn aloft

As the figure retreats to the seventh chamber

He suddenly turns, a piercing sharp cry

Now the Prince lay dead in the hall of the velvet...

Then summoning the wild courage of despair,

A throng of revellers at once threw themselves

Into the black apartment, and seizing the mummer,

Whose tall dark figure stood erect and motionless

Within the shadow of the ebony clock, gasped

In unutterable horror at finding the grave

Cerements and corpse-like mask, which they

Handled with so violent a rudeness, untenated

By any tangible form.

And now was acknowlegded the presence

Of the Red Death. He had come as a thief

In the night and one by one droppd the revellers

In the blood-bedewed halls of their revel,

And died each in the despairing posture of his fall.

As the life of the ebony clock went out

With that the last of the gay.

And the flames of the tripods expired. And Darkness

And Decay and the Red Death held illimitable dominion over all...

Edgar Allen Poe (1809-1849)