In a lonely theatre at the end of time, weeping angels gather to watch a grotesque play. The actors are mindless puppets, jerked around by vast, invisible horrors while they mutter and chase a phantom they never catch, running in a circle back to the same empty spot. Madness, Sin, and Horror fuel the plot, creating a mood of suffocating hopelessness. An icy dread settles early and never lifts; this is not a tragedy that offers catharsis, only a cold stare into the grave. Then, from the wings, a crimson Worm — raw and writhing — slithers out and devours the struggling mimes as the angels sob. The lights die, the curtain slams down like a funeral pall, and the angels rise to pronounce the show’s true name: the tragedy “Man,” with the Conqueror Worm as its star. The speaker’s voice drips with bitter certainty: life is a scripted torment, and death always takes the final bow.
The Conqueror Worm — Summary
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 go At bidding of vast formless things That shift the scenery to and fro, Flapping from out their Condor wings Invisible Wo!
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 the angels 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, And the angels, all pallid and wan, Uprising, unveiling, affirm That the play is the tragedy, "Man," And its hero the Conqueror Worm.