Deathspell Omega
The Long Defeat
1. Enantiodromia
I have come to bring death, terror, and destruction
Yes, the arkhè of this world is fire,
But for all the smoke that rises,
Something must also come down!
Should their scales be gripped,
Should they sneer at the dance around balance,
The sentencing from the stars will scream:
Death, silence, and oblivion!
The wise claim there are, in truth,
Many different fires burning with different smoke,
Most of them vain and very few divine
I have come to bring death and destruction
For the arkhè of this world truly is fire!
And for all the smoke you see rising,
Something will come down on you,
Blazing and burning shall it come for you.
Smitten sore with wretched wrath
Under the light of burning stars
Three hundred gods say murder all!
Behold the arch-fire, ignited by entire swarms of locusts!
Tentacles of war and fire,
Just as war is thrice holy,
Behold and beware as we join the dance.
Light turns into darkness, lively noise yields to silence,
And heat surrenders to the cold,
All that was dry has now become drenched in liquid.
A cosmos within the cosmos.
It is mankind, the gods,
And all the devils of creation at once.
And something else – something new,
It’s a power beyond you,
Untamed, and growing exponentially.
I have come to bring death, and destruction!
I have come to bring death, silence, and oblivion!
You will be made to remember the time when mountains were your cathedrals…
You will be made to remember the time when the ocean was your womb…
You will be made to remember the time when fertile soil was holy ground…
No matter how high a tower you build from the skulls of fallen foes,
No matter the multitudes of cities reduced to rubble,
The child of man has already been awakened and fed,
The child of man has already been unleashed…
And He has come to bring vile death!
And He has come to bring ruin!
And He has come to bring silence!
And He has come to bring an end!
And He has come to bring new life!
And He has come to bring pure light!
And He has come to bring concord!
And He has come to bring order!
2. Eadem, Sed Aliter
Carrion beetles pouring from his mouth:
I have devised a new light that burns brighter above all others.
I have risen towers, structures of such magnitude
That even the mountains pale with envy.
I have made myself the greatest of all gods
And everything living now bends to my will!
You are indeed the king of kings.
May the greatness of your deeds be bestowed upon you!
You have ploughed the soil and left it poisoned.
Eadem, sed aliter!
So, the fruits of the earth turn to blight in your mouth
And your crops are a slow and tasteless poison.
The air was the sweetest of all earthly delights,
But now the fumes of your creations smother the skies
And the stars are all but forgotten.
So, your breath will serve you pestilence
And turn your lungs into peat.
The bones of the earth you have broken
You melted the marvels of the depths
Forging leashes of silver and gold.
So, now your own bones will be broken
And their flesh melted off.
Carrion beetles pouring from his mouth:
But isn't strife the core of existence?
And progress the arkhè of our lives?
I won this world with sword and fire
And carved it to my image!
My claim to the throne is just!
You have devised a new light and your eyes will see no further.
You have risen towers for a one long fall downwards...
You made a desert and called it peace...
So, rest assured – your claim will be processed justly
And the greatness of your deeds bestowed upon you!
3. The Long Defeat
To the shadows of ancient trees, moss, and autumn leaves
To austere ridges, sharp rocks, frozen streams, and the wind howling over bare summits
To thunderstorms and feverish full-moon nights. Red wine and brazen days
To the mysteries of knowledge, the scent of an old book
To resistance - no matter how vain
To sacrifices with the taste of rotten blood
To comrades, never to be forgotten: and lest we forget the Holy Dead
To the burning light of Lucifer, blinding the eye and liberating the heart!
To the veil between divinity and man: the Devil! Yes!
To the abhorrent lord of this earth, hearken to the long defeat
4. Sie Sind Gerichtet!
You revel in inequity, inequity is your womb!
How dare you even speak?
Your hand has been too busy casting stones
When all the while, it should have covered your shameful face.
Oh yes, we saw you. Yes! We saw you...
You bless with wounds that never heal
You heal through wounds beyond any blessing.
Crime-turned ambrosia oozes
Through all the pores of your skin.
The paths you tread are the sons and daughters
Of the wound that festers forever:
The wound whose pus nurtures everything
The wound whose pus nourishes all
Your civilisation is merely a fleeting attempt
At taming the beast.
As you cannot fend off that ageless urge,
How sly you are to channel it instead!
Your civilisations stand as monuments to perpetual discord:
A boundless will to power over the infinite...
Culture, civilisation, culture...
The forever-festering wound
Would have it no other way
5. Our Life Is Your Death
You must claim lives, so many lives,
To exert upon this earth an earnest will to live.
Becoming an instrument of death is not a choice, but fate,
Under laws made eternal!
Our life is your death
And our death is your life
In this shrinking world
At whose throat
Even Eden draws her blade...
In this zero-sum game.
We've tamed the absurd and brought all discord to a halt!
Those are the marvels of hierarchy,
Upon which a Polis is built:
Tribe and class, caste and creed...
We will be the Sparta of your Athens!
If it was murder the first to be outlawed,
That's because it's our life's blood.
Whether by word or whether by blade,
It is death that permeates our every quest!
Our death is your life
And our life is your death
In this shrinking world
At whose throat
Even Eden draws her blade...
In this zero-sum game.
There won't be rest nor peace of mind
So long as anything that breathes evades our grasp.
Become death to become life...
Swear the oath and be reborn!
Yet in the swing of the pendulum,
Through the course of age,
No one retains mastery over death.
And still, under gods or tyrants, or philosopher kings...
Our life is our death and all is well under the sun.
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