The Song of the Bats by Robert E. Howard (Poem)
“The Song of the Bats” was first published in the May 1927 issue of Weird Tales. It has been reprinted several times in Robert E. Howard collections of short stories and poetry, such as Always Comes Evening (1977), Shadow Kingdoms (2004), and The Collected Poetry of Robert E. Howard (2009).
About Robert E. Howard
Robert Ervin Howard was an American writer of pulp fiction. Often considered to be the man who began the sword and sorcery subgenre, Howard was the creator of Conan the Barbarian.
Howard began writing fiction when he was just nine years old. In December 1922, aged 16, his work began paying off when The Tattler (Brownwood High School newspaper) printed two of his stories: “‘Golden Hope Christmas” and “West is West”. Then, in 1924, after years of having his stories rejected by Weird Tales, he made his first sale to the magazine with a caveman story called “Spear and Fang”. This marked the start of Howard’s career as a pulp fiction writer and Weird Tales subsequently became one of his main outlets for weird fiction.
The Song of the Bats
By Robert E. Howard
The dusk was on the mountain
And the stars were dim and frail
When the bats came flying, flying
From the river and the vale
To wheel against the twilight
And sing their witchy tale.
“We were kings of old!” they chanted,
“Rulers of a world enchanted;
“Every nation of creation
“Owned our lordship over men.
“Diadems of power crowned us,
“Then rose Solomon to confound us,
“In the form of beasts he bound us,
“So our rule was broken then.”
Whirling, wheeling into westward,
Fled they in their phantom flight;
Was it but a wing-beat music
Murmured through the star-gemmed night?
Or the singing of a ghost clan
Whispering of forgotten might?
Robert E. Howard (1906 – 1936)