Ihsahn

Sandstorm Breach of burning skies Unyielding tempest of eternity and timeline Chaos - all consuming sanctuary of reigning fire Sacred heart of frozen soil Unholy Apocalyptic death cloud Unbarred Disputed not held ? Floating 6 feet above the ground...

White like deathbeds Grief-worn sheets Winter occupy the planes And this is the after The ending of ends Ghostly death-cries Soar the heavens Like starving vultures And this is the after The ending of ends This is the after Where nothing transcen...

Again I find myself in this narrow chamber And my kettle simmers with the same old brew Now turning sour There must be more to this than chemistry As my soul burns with fever Instinctively I do repeat the simple formula "Solve et coagula" He stands to face h...

Of all rejected creatures unloved of all who defy the predestination that divides mankind into the saved and damned he was the first The lurking punishment with blood he did reveal Death And through the ages run a river deep and red the ever present...

There was always a presence In the tantalizing shadows of your dreams An enigmatic whisper Resonating though your very being And now you have come too far The paths you followed here are gone This is the black, this is the night This is your dawn It...

Eventually the fire overcame The smell of (...) Now seal the purposes anew The night outside was still the same From the window one could see The long dark road stretch back for miles A path of peril, sleepless black Now breathing slow alone, not fre...

Were you not humble not submissive? Would you not bend your knee? Did you question or object to the word of the many? Had you a vision of your own? Saint of the damned Icon of the rejected Primeval insurgent Ascend O' Morning star Ascend "How art...

The sky is clouded and grey like a mirror Dreams of celestial bliss buried deep An invisible web of whispers spread out over dead-end streets silently blessing the virtue of sleep I'm still Called by the fire My spirit Called by the fire Yes, i'm s...

To drain the blood from this vast This black, stinking oil And scorch the prints all there (...) And deeds go (...) To pull the dead from the jaws All this treacherous (...) As the (...) And the mouth to the (...) To cut off every link That ever tou...

Stay And I will turn these Unforgiving words into a star Stay This scenery would change If we could watch it from afar Pain Like icons of our suffering Distilled to works of art Pain A sting of life to bind us To these heavens torn apart Celest...

Citizen! Whence came your voice your right to speak? Is there a purpose to your tongue and gnawing teeth? I ask thee; How deep and hollow is your mouth? What lie is too decayed for you to stomach? With humility and obedience you pride yourself Eva...

Stranded at the borders of perception Onto a blackened heaven, washed ashore In voluntary exile from deception A peaceful mind, alas, a heart at war A solitary voyager upon uncharted land Left beaten on the rock, nowhere to go But to face an arctic map...

(...) Descending backwards Through the sleepless black Washing the fire inglare The small (...) Breathing with emptiness Filled with collumns of winter and night The stinging sensation remains Of hungry eyes, nurturing the pain The stinging sensatio...

A shattered soul presented Like a disassembled gun Assassins rushing up the stairs All allies on the run Grasping for the pieces With hands of swarming flies A sleeper agent set to face A death where no one dies Cold sweat dripping Like hammers to t...

Night comes with the smell of murder And shadows fall long on my trail Such are the hazards of my craft All lights disperse And the devil takes me down There is panic in my fascination Like soothing wine is my despair Gracefully I fall to pieces Then lights...

The open air Atop this mountain Welcomes my hungered voice Yet - in the echoes Of my indulgence I hear a calling from below Silent cries To my solitude profound In too deep There is no return For the soul unbound In too deep I draw circles Sacred boundaries...

The air is thick with strangers Laughing through your screaming lungs Imploding in your chest like death Absent exit signs ignite the flames, The fear, the rage that tear down walls Alas, in dreams alone they all collapse These hoarders of paragraphs...

Frozen Lakes On Mars Red fiery star, god of war Blood stained archon in the sky Far beyond the reach of those again From the west, from the east Burning red, terror completely To watch the throne, cranial vent volcano Upon this temple gave out of all who came...

Upon the edge of winter's chasm The seeds of evil flowers grow And a sleeping giant curls below In fever burning nightmare spasms I rest upon this trembling ground And in my bones they resonate And thus, alike, we lie in wait For both of us are northern bound...

I have tried so hard to regain my faith in man Yet, I fail again to uphold this deception His collective truths are far too salt I return instead To the Heart and Self and say; "Unutterable and nameless is that which maketh my soul's pain and swe...

The room fell still, submerged by time The chatter drowned in liquid hours If ever words were obsolete The vibrant air would speak There is conduct Like honour among thieves There is grace Within the fearful eyes of those who seek And we know We kno...

Screaming Into a void of disbelief Bleeding slowly The victim of a narcissistic blow Life can be so unforgiving Yet, what is there really to forgive? All you really have to do is... Longing for the hopeless Loosing all to own the end Maybe you will...

Time, dissolves before my eyes I know, the graves, they always try to hide Then, what are graves to me? Their sins are not infectious I claim immunity to their disease Oh, the serpent coils again I will consume the fire to purge the entrails of my soul...

Come suffering, Apocalypse Release the fires of Hell I call upon destruction and despair Here the days of slumber end I beckon the night to live and overcome the fear Come sin, come shame congregation of contempt I bid you welcome to the pyre Will ou...

Lend me the eyes of millennia Align the rapid glimpse of lives in frames Like fading photographs in ashes In desperate seconds, closed in by the flames Let me walk into their cities When dust and sand has covered every trace If love, of pain and liberty...

Sacrilege Profanity Rabid convulsion Of blasphemy Thus appear my venomous cries To your ears Were they truths or were they lies Rejection Eternal Tyranny Of denial I would surely burn myself at the stake Were my demons the spawn Of your lusts and perversions...

Shadows seep through the pores Of a rain worn, marble statue And drain the fading colours From the depths of my eyes To see, and feel this frozen river That is tears and blood and fate Washing over me, like a cleansing fire Washing over me, like it was...

In a world of haunting mirrors Your eyes should have been closed Instead you lost your shadow To become, like them, a ghost Immersed within a mist of death You withered in the light And left your disillusioned soul To tremble in the night Look beyond...

Bring me my wine And the head of the world I will drink to h er demise The subtle art of decapitation The perfect irony of such an end Bring me the flesh Of your sin and repentance Display the worlds delights This last meal My righteous friend I serve Thee...

It was never The icy winds of the heights But the coldness of the world That hardened my foundation Whether your approach Is that of praise or blasphemy The construction of my being Will remain the same If my soaring presence Threatens to break your neck The...

I have felt the hunger, The restless howling call, To lift my gaze across the seas And seek out foreign shores Yet, for all riches They may bring forth, The undeniable remains; My heart is of the North Beyond horizons There is kinship to be found T...

Perhaps the fight is over The bloodstains surely indicate a major loss Who knows what swollen idiot stumbled out of this arena with an oversized belt Or maybe I'm the bigger fool who nurture every fight and every loss Keeping them alive In the hopeless disil...

Just like secrets, twisted allibies, for empty graves, Unlike manors, cut and burned, a thousand times Not like ours, coiled in coffins, weeping echoes, Weeping echoes Not by statues, golden monuments, war houses of worship Unlike manors, where the great whi...

Half awake, deprived of sleep and dignity I stand before the blinding lights My body trembling, survival instincts gasp for air Rays of madness tear the nights in me Torn from the slumber, like a drunken king To watch the cities burn The world I used to...

Awake, O' serpent of my heart It is time The sun stands high and unfaithful crowds await Thee Redemption in their eyes and stone at hand The arena hungers for your venom Let the games begin Bring in the lions Bring in the beasts It is time to confr...

I know I put this pressure on you To deal with and accept my being And the darkness that sometimes leak Through the cracks of my skull That slow grimy shadow Like oil spill from a sinking ship Still breathing and conscious Stare through a stranger's ey...

Too proud Too ashamed Incompatible I don't know what I fear The most What I am Or what I'm not The chemistry Of the fallen soul That being broken Is what makes it whole Too proud Too ashamed Incompatible With myself Too proud Too ashamed Cold, invincible...

The play for years of speed Killers, romantic dreams Oh misanthrophy The play memories Killers, romantic dreams Oh the misanthrophe Deep down the shame Knowing day will only lie Fabricated lullaby But now it seems that all the shame And secrecy was...

More like a gesture Acknowledging the coldness Of its touch I pull myself closer Around the neek As to contain myself From disappearing In the flux And the heavens roll violently Over golden waves And rust-red hands Dripping wet In all their dying splendour...

Gently lay my head against the wall and listen For the footsteps, outside, to fade out and disappear Hold my breath, a pause suspended dust in silence Exhale, relief, that's one less enemy Or a saviour lost I threw my eyes So far into the void A wager...

As the sun returns From the shades of night So am I reborn from my own corruption I invoke the consuming fire And from the ashes mould The renaissance of my decadent self At the dawn of my rebirth The heart is overflowing I indulge and dissipate And when th...

(...) (...) Like a statue (...) With no more room for (...) Slowly taken down by age Going back through every page Something old, something new Something borrowed, something blue They like a monument's (...) (...) (...) (...) Rime frost blockin...

Static Dogmatic Death cult Fanatic Hidden In the open Masked By tradition Your face, your heart Fervent to obey Your face, your heart You gave it all away I'd rather live a life in sin And take a devil's fall Than let the madmen of belief Mak...

Magnetic emptiness Drew me into cathedrals of silence Only to see them collapse and fall Like promises on the frozen ground And as the dust settled My hands reached out to ash clouds and ruins Eagerly, like onto strings To feel destruction and play the sound...

Raising another tower Crumbling in the shadows Of the forming idea Too tired for pride A thunderous voice In cold, wordless tongues Resonate deep In the heart of the night The bittersweet song Of a poets lament; That even his best Are but feeble translations...

These are barren lands Austere and cold Desert night Of frozen time Endless fields of -- Has lost is trail The blood of war Cold lair Howling winds of sand, Hunger, violence, solitary, godless This scenery So far so burned So beautiful It yearns for more T...

I crawl through mud and secrecy To reach the edge of sanity And fall... through cleansing air Clashing down into the sea We - between the eagle and the snake Beyond what is real and what is fake Between the eagle and the snake The walls come down Emb...

He hammers the earth with a shovel Anger thunders with every strike Inside his skull a funeral a cold-blooded murder. he hammers the earth with a shovel yet, his grave was empty from the start someone or something to forget A hole in the ground He...

The word is easy dripping sweet and cocky from the tongue vaguely describing the taste of blood A distant cry arise from the fathomless well that is my soul I can not hear the words so I throw my heart in like a coin and wish that it would sink fore...

(...) slow-motion (...) (...) (...) This smell of isolation A hall of mirrors multiplying Grotesque features of a golden idol Melting fast in the fires of confession And the shame feeds the anger feeds the shame Dim lights from a dying coal cast a...

He lies quiet now In the nothing And there is no epitaph No stone Yet - his legacy flows Like a river Walker of barren paths Seer of night Friend of shadows A carrier of light And his legacy flows Like a river from ice The hungry heart opens And drinks from...

Spread out clean sheets Get the mind ready for the deep sleep Fade out the cold lights Still, these linens feel like concrete Drifting though closed eyes Watching incapacities materialize Like in the song, a prisoner Of my own device Another part of...

Quiet surface Blurred reflection Heaven's mirror Calm awake Like glass until it breaks Like glass until it breaks Peaceful silence Pressing void Moving shadows In the melody Like glass until it breaks Like glass until it breaks No ships set sail on this oc...

Prayers Confessions The peaceful tools Of a righteous man Redemption Forgiveness Serenity complete And you believe That time will heal Erase your wounds Your lies conceal Cleanse your soul In dreams of death Wherein you may concede But when you wake Remember...

The early hours Of this late autumn dawn All ready taste of winter Cold mist rise From blinding waters Gracefully into the light And I can choose to watch Absorb this careless beauty Without restrictions make it part of me Until I too dissolve A f...

Inside a dreamer's palace So desolate and vast Amidst the solemn pinacles And shadows of a past You lie awake to find The somber evening hours fade Away like childhood memories Your mind withdrawn to shade The night on the horizon Has whispered in y...

A tranquil silence echoes through the blackness Stumbling away each step a fall Into another void the ever endless Fluctuating centre of it all I've seen you here before I couldn't reach you We spoke the truth with bleeding, cut out tongues And turned o...

One great man was silent of his superiority He was openly flattered and hated silently Another spoke of his will to aspire to create beyond himself And the self-inflicted impotent man felt spat at by all ambition The solitary pierced the skin of deni...