The Conqueror Worm

An audience of weeping angels watches a play performed by "mimes, in the form of God on high", and controlled by vast formless shapes looming behind the scenes.

An angel throng, bewinged, bedight In veils, and drowned in tears, Sit in a theatre, to see A play of hopes and fears, While the orchestra breathes fitfully The music of the spheres.

Mimes, in the form of God on high, Mutter and mumble low, And hither and thither fly— Mere puppets they, who come and go At bidding of vast formless things That shift the scenery to and fro, Flapping from out their Condor wings Invisible Wo!

With its Phantom chased for evermore, By a crowd that seize it not, Through a circle that ever returneth in To the self-same spot, And much of Madness, and more of Sin, And Horror the soul of the plot.

And, over each quivering form, The curtain, a funeral pall, Comes down with the rush of a storm, And the angels, all pallid and wan, Uprising, unveiling, affirm That the play is the tragedy, "Man," And its hero the Conqueror Worm.

Poe's mother and father were both actors, and the poem uses theater metaphors throughout to deal with human life on a universal level.

Though Poe was referring to an ancient connection between worms and death, he may have been inspired by "The Proud Ladye", a poem by Spencer Wallis Cone which was reviewed in an 1840 issue of Burton's Gentleman's Magazine.

"[9] In 1935, Baltimore-born composer Franz Bornschein wrote a three-part chorus for women with orchestra or piano accompaniment based on "The Conqueror Worm".

Although American International Pictures' prints featured a voice-over with Vincent Price in character as Matthew Hopkins reciting "The Conqueror Worm", the film is not actually an adaptation of Poe's poem.