Dreamland

Sopor Aeternus' 'Dreamland' is a haunting and evocative exploration of a surreal and melancholic landscape. The lyrics paint a vivid picture of a journey through a dark, otherworldly realm, filled with eerie and unsettling imagery. The song opens with the narrator describing a path that is 'obscure and lonely,' haunted by 'ill angels' and ruled by an 'eidolon, named night.' This sets the tone for a journey through a place that exists 'out of space- out of time,' suggesting a realm that is both timeless and otherworldly.

The imagery in the song is rich and evocative, with descriptions of 'bottomless vales and boundless floods,' 'chasm, and caves, and titan woods,' and 'mountains toppling evermore into seas without a shore.' These descriptions create a sense of a vast, desolate, and ever-changing landscape, filled with forms that are hidden by 'tears that drip all over.' The repeated references to water, such as 'seas that restlessly aspire' and 'lakes that endlessly outspread their lone waters,' add to the sense of melancholy and desolation.

The song also explores themes of memory and loss, with the narrator encountering 'sheeted memories of the past' and 'white-robed forms of friends long given, in agony, to the earth- and heaven.' These encounters suggest a place where the past is ever-present and where the dead continue to linger. The song concludes with the narrator returning home from this 'ultimate dim thule,' suggesting a journey that is both physical and metaphorical. The overall effect is one of a haunting and melancholic exploration of a surreal and otherworldly realm, filled with evocative imagery and themes of memory, loss, and the passage of time.