Fever Sheds

A man stare's into fetid gutters
 And leering meriden stares back
 What cleanses is beyond him
 What cures?
 Far above him
 A pantheon of pestilence
 Paupers enshrined in Fever Sheds
 From holy typhus' hands
 As lowly drudge of noxious seeds to sow
 A consecration of inflammation
 From callous soil did grow
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 As blighted walls for gangrenous minds
 For rusting spirits and fever dreams
 Opiate madness and sulphurous haze
 All cathedrals to quarantine
 Naught but abattoirs for screaming
 Lunatics with blessed brimstone in their lungs
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 All that is dissolute and loathsome becomes his city
 A byword for intractable human misery
 And as they lead him through the gauntlet
 The spires are reaching high, playing arms of Atlas
 Belching forth their cancerous mire
 Poverty's sores weep into these gaping mouths
 The gaping mouths of starving child and gutter-dweller
 Of starving child and gutter-dweller
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 This is how - how a nation dies
 Mile by God-forsaken mile
 Like seeds upon the callous soil
 Mile by barren mile
 Mile by barren mile
 This is how a nation dies
 Mile by God-forsaken mile
 Like seeds upon the callous soil
 Mile by barren mile
 This is how a nation dies
 Mile by God-forsaken mile
 Like seeds upon the callous soil
 Mile by barren mile
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 Gas lights with tired eyes
 Their glare as perdition's outer circles
 Rest upon him - the conspirator
 In machinations with Merihem
 Yet, are his maladies to be counted amongst his mother
 His blaze amongst his blessings
 His skin rots and falls from his bones
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 In driving rain
 From bridges o'er noisome waters hanging
 He carves his words, in anguished rage
 On the pillars of the golden ribcage
 Withering beast under dolorous sky
 With gaunt, stooped wretch plunging harpoon into the eye
 Saying: "All greatness stands firm in the storm"
 "All greatness stands firm in the storm"