PANIC

The eyes of the portraits on the wall

Look at me, follow me,

Stare incessantly:

I take it their glance means nothing at all?

— Clearly, oh clearly! Nothing at all...

Out in the gardens by the lake

The sleeping peacocks suddenly wake;

Out in the gardens, moonlit and forlorn,

Each of them sounds his mournful horn:

Shrill peals that waver and crack and break.

What can have made the peacocks wake?