Kings - Mephisto Walz

In sensuous coil and heartless toil

In sinuous course and armored force

In savage harms that yield to charms

In all these things are snakes like kings

Uneven rough and high enough

Yet low folk roam;

their flanks as home

And wild things haunt them;

hungry, gaunt

In all these things are snakes like kings

In savage harms that yield to charms

Uneven rough and high enough

In sinuous course and armored force

In all these things are snakes like kings

The things that claw and the things that gore

Are unreliable things

And so is a man with a sword in his hand

And rivers, and women and kings