Peter Hammill - Gog/Magog (in Bromine Chambers)

Extracted from In Camera, 1974

Some call me SATAN others have me GOD
some name me NEMO...I am unborn.
Some speak of me in anagrams,
some grieve upon my wrath...
the ones who give me service
I grant my scorn.
My words are
'Too late', 'Never', 'Impossible', and 'Gone';
my home is in the sunset and the dawn.
My Name is locked in silence,
sometimes it's whispered out of spite.
All gates are locked,
all doors are barred and bolted,
there is no place for flight.
Will you not come to me
and love me for one more night?

Some see me shining, others have me dull;
gun-metal and cut diamond -I am ALL.
Some swear they see me weeping
in the poppy-fields of France...
in the tumbling of the dice see them fall!
Some laugh and see me laughing
down the corridors of power:
some see my sign on Caesar and his pall.
My face is robed in darkness,
sometimes you glimpse me in the shade,
All friends have gone,
all calls are weak and wasted,
there is no more to say.
Will you not crawl to me
and love me for one more day?

Some wish me empty, others will me full,
some crave of me infinity - I am NONE.
Some look for me in symbols,
some trace my line in stars,
some count my ways in numbers:
I am No One.
Some chronicle my movements,
my colours and my clothes,
some trace the work in progress
it is done.
My soul is cast in crystal
yet unrevealed beneath the knife.
All wells are dry, all bread is masked in fungus
and now disease is rife.
Will you not run from this
and love me for one more life?


In Bromine Chambers
there can be no mercy,
no bitter flagellation for your sins;
no forgiveness and no sackcloth
can cease the dance
of ashes on the wind.

Too late now for a wish
to change all wishing;
too late to change, to breathe, to grow.
Too late to smother out the tell-tale footprints
which mark your passage through the greying snow.