Beneath chill slivers of a silent moon,

Through streets which greeted Ib & Babylon;

A sand-wind snakes its moaning,

tongueless tune

Of aeons past.  Moreover better gone.

Low temple passageways Alhazred dreamed

Exude suggestive tendrils of such breath

That even his mad mind awoke---& screamed

To learn the cursed impermanence of death.

No wandering Bedouin dares shelter here;

Deep desert wisdom ageless as the Nile

Still murmurs at the marrow of his fear

Of Elder Ones whom time could not defile,

But faded to a snarling & a cry . . .

Dim serpent-shades of hate which

cannot die.