They took me slumming, where gaunt walls of brick Bulge outward with a viscous stored-up evil, And twisted faces, thronging foul and thick, Wink messages to alien god and devil. A million fires were blazing in the streets, And from flat roofs a furtive few would fly Bedraggled birds into the yawning sky While hidden drums droned on with measured beats.
I knew those fires were brewing monstrous things, And that those birds of space had been Outside - I guessed to what dark planet's crypts they plied, And what they brought from Thog beneath their wings. The others laughed - till struck too mute to speak By what they glimpsed in one bird's evil beak.