The Eve Of The War

No one would have believed
 In the last years of the nineteenth century
 That human affairs were being watched from the timeless worlds of space
 No one could have dreamed that we were being scrutinized
 As someone with a microscope studies creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water
 Few men even considered the possibility of life on other planets
 And yet, across the gulf of space
 Minds immeasurably superior to ours
 Regarded this Earth with envious eyes
 And slowly and surely, they drew their plans against us
 At midnight, on the 12th of August
 A huge mass of luminous gas erupted from Mars and sped towards Earth
 Across two hundred million miles of void
 Invisibly hurtling towards us
 Came the first of the missiles that were to bring so much calamity to Earth
 As I watched, there was another jet of gas
 It was another missile, starting on its way
 And that's how it was for the next ten nights
 A flare, spurting out from Mars
 Bright green, drawing a green mist behind it
 A beautiful, but somehow disturbing sight
 Ogilvy, the astronomer, assured me we were in no danger
 He was convinced there could be no living thing on that remote
 Forbidding planet
 The chances of anything coming from Mars
 Are a million to one, he said
 The chances of anything coming from Mars
 Are a million to one, but still, they come
 Then came the night the first missile approached Earth
 It was thought to be an ordinary falling star
 But next day there was a huge crater in the middle of the common
 And Ogilvy came to examine what lay there
 A cylinder, thirty yards across, glowing hot
 With faint sounds of movement coming from within
 Suddenly the top began moving, rotating, unscrewing
 And Ogilvy feared there was a man inside trying to escape
 He rushed to the cylinder but the intense heat stopped him
 Before he could burn himself on the metal
 The chances of anything coming from Mars
 Are a million to one, he said
 The chances of anything coming from Mars
 Are a million to one, but still, they come
 Yes, the chances of anything coming from Mars
 Are a million to one, he said
 The chances of anything coming from Mars
 Are a million to one, but still, they come
 It seems totally incredible to me now that
 Everyone spent that evening as though it were just like any other
 From the railway station came the sound of shunting trains
 Ringing and rumbling, softened almost into melody by the distance
 It all seemed so safe and tranquil