Vincent Price, actor extraordinaire

reaches into his cloak with large sympathetic hands,

smiles with that crooked cataclysm of a face,

eyebrows as restless as Tower Bridge,

pulls back the velvet to reveal plum red lining

 

and have us fooled;

what might happen next?

will there be bats or spiders

or perhaps the Tingler.

 

He merely recites in broad sweeps

as camp as a masquerade,

then leads us gently with menace and malice

to some mock byzantine crumbling palace

where histories are treasured in layered tombs.

 

But then we find arc lights, cameras;

he relaxes and becomes your valued friend,

instead of Dr Phibes or the Witchfinder General,

the voice that warns you of the Hounds of Hell

or his penchant for art and cooking well.