The Tunnel

There’d been stories about a tunnel

In the old, Victorian house,

We didn’t know where it led to,

But were keen on finding out,

It opened into a passageway

From a library wall of books,

Was dark, and damp and foreboding

If you merely went by looks.

To us it had spelt adventure,

To Jeremy Coates and me,

‘As long as we take a flashlight,’

I’d said to Jeremy,

We waited till after midnight

When the others were asleep,

We didn’t want to involve them all

Till we had taken a peep.

‘What do you think we’ll find there?’

He said as we opened the door,

Pushing aside a shelf of books

To stand on a flagstoned floor,

The passage led down a flight of steps

All green, and covered in moss,

We’d ventured in to this place of sin

On the date of Pentecost.

We should have known what we’d find there

If we’d taken note of the books,

The ones on the sliding bookshelf

And hidden in crannies and nooks,

There was more than a single Grimoire,

And the Oera Linda book,

That was known as Himmler’s Bible,

If we’d only taken a look.

There were copies of the Picatrix,

And the Munich Manual,

The first bore spells in Arabic,

The next strange animals,

There were books on demonology

Black magic spells as well,

And even a long chronology

Of the many circles of hell.

We ventured into that passageway

Not knowing any of this,

No doubt, if only we’d read them all

We wouldn’t be risking this,

But on we marched in the dead of night

To follow the flashlight beam,

Where the walls oozed iridescent streams

And the smell was quite obscene.

We walked a mile through the tunnel

Where it ended in a crypt,

With panels through to the street level

That would keep it dimly lit,

But this was night and the only light

Beamed in through the pillar flutes,

From the gas lamps out on the cobbled street

By the church known as St. Lukes.

And all around there were catafalques

Where the coffins lay in state,

Down in this modern catacomb

Where the devil lay in wait,

For a goat’s head sat on the further wall

By an altar, scarred and scored,

With the shapes of naked women who

Were seen as the devil’s w****s.

A cross was stood on the altar but

It was mounted upside down,

Ready to celebrate black mass

In this hidden underground,

Then just as we stood and took this in

A coffin had raised its lid,

And Jeremy screamed a terrible scream

While I ran round and hid.

A shape rose up in a long black cloak

That had eyes of instant fire,

Teeth that could rip a corpse to shreds

In a moment of desire,

For evil never had looked so dark

As the horns on that spectre’s head,

While Jeremy screamed just one last scream

And fell by the coffin, dead.

I don’t remember how I survived

My flight up that passageway,

I’d thrown all caution to the winds

When I heard the spectre say:

‘Who dares to sully my sanctum, and

Disturb my sated sleep,

I’ve roamed abroad for a thousand years

That the seeds I’ve sown will keep.’

I reached the end of that passageway

And I slid the shelves across,

All of those books were glowing now

With the innocence I’d lost,

And then I heard but a mile away

Was the tolling of a bell,

Up in the belfry of St. Lukes

That covered the path to hell.

David Lewis Paget

Reviews

[A Soap Mess Stories]

An interesting story as akways.

[Coyote Poetry]

A amazing story shared in the poem. I liked the journey and the discovery. I liked the feel of interest and of danger. A very nice ending. Thank you David for sharing the amazing poetry. I enjoyed this one.
Coyote

[Escribe]

I really enjoyed this. It was easy to imagine the tunnel.

[Tony Jordan]

Definitely a camp fire/peat fireplace story - could really see it being acted out by a Seanachie for his supper in a rural stone cottage.
An ancient art lives on in you DLP.