"Beyond Eleventh Hour" lyrics - CRADLE OF FILTH

"All mirrors lead to my palace
My exotic pleasure temple
Wherein my court is both gracious and insatiable
Pure and obscene
For where pumps the true heart of life
There too seeps corruption
And from this my new Eden of nightshades, black
Henbane, sphinxes
Opium and roses weaned on tears and blood
Will rise up like lust
And the shadow of my dark consort shall extend
Himself across the face of the world
And Hell will come with Him"

Part of the garden, her dark Eden
Fed blood by poisoned fronds
My heart hardened in her wet season
Treading mud in her slough of despond
But only now
A path lies straight before me
The maze is ploughed half through with hate
And her crop is dripping red

Beyond eleventh hour

Her beauty and brute power
Grows stronger by the day
And with each rose that she deflowers
The longer her throes of madness stay

In her grip on shredded sheets
Once our fingertips had dug and clutched
She whispered dreadful things to me

She wanted war with God
The underdog baring sharpened teeth
With her armies raised from suffering
To ascend on jet black wings

She'd break off holy limbs
On the racks of her witch hunt
And crush the church beneath her heel
The Pope in homage to her cunt

A dark horse forcing nightmares
To wring submissives dry
A vampire madam batterfang
With vicious streaks a mile wide

Beyond eleventh hour

Her kiss has turned dismissive
Her glance holds slight contempt
Instead those eyes burn on the prize
Of fates she really likes to tempt

In her grip on shredded sheets
Gasping from conquered peaks of passion
She whispered dreadful things to me

She wanted war with God
The underdog baring sharpened teeth
With her armies raised from suffering
To ascend on jet black wings

She'd tear down mighty spires
Then rear them up anew
Orders forged to her desires
The eleventh hour nearly through

Lilith, the abyss, the slithering mists
That 'cause all souls to stray
How to resist those seductive gifts
On the shore of her unholy ways?

She calls my name so softly
From deep banks of scented fog
I almost lose myself before it starts
But my spirit keeps its silence
As I drift across the lake
A glimpse of harem secrets
Now her velvet curtain parts

She is glaring like the moon

The wind dies down, eavesdropping
As I bow before her throne
And she descends to greet me
Like the royal bitch to which she's grown

"Come closer, what have you to say?
Black cat got your tongue?

"I am not your slave
Nor are you my saviour"

"But Isaac, I'm the only one..."

I hold those cold deceiving eyes
Her once hypnotic gaze
And pledge eternal love, then walk away
Thunder seethes behind me
Death adjusts her favourite mask
Another lover smothered by her sanguinary darkness

Clasped in the garden, here you heard
This story blustered through
I asked her pardon, swore my word
I'd score her sweetmeats just like you

For only now
The truth lies prone before me
I couldn't leave her even if she stormed
The heavens as were promised

Beyond eleventh hour

Lilith, the abyss. the slithering mists
Will come for you this eve
Lustrous the cusp of her lingering tryst
Before those fatal kisses bleed

Beyond eleventh hour

She will make of you a plaything
Scant amusement for her bed
And when naked flesh forgets to sing
She'll take your fucking soul instead

Midnight strikes, the candles sputter
Muttering their reeking spells
I snuff their tongues, my heart a-flutter
These words I speak are gates to Hell