The Drums

I wrote this poem for American Lit class as an immitation of the first three stanzas of Edgar Allan Poe's The Bells.
It is mostly unreadable and the last two stanzas were written during a Diet Coke induced, semi-conscious trance from around 11:00 pm to 12:30 in the morning the day before it was due. The last stanza sounds like a bad Beatles song. For the original Poe poem, visit http://www.online-literature.com/poe/575/
Enjoy.

I
Feel the beating of the drums--
Battle drums!
How much pain and dying with their pounding rhythm comes!
Hear the tapping, tapping, tapping,
To the marching of the few!
All the battle flags are flapping
And the fates are softly laughing
At this ghastly game they view;
While they thud, thud, thud
Men lay dying in the mud
To the bitter salutation that so powerfully comes
From the drums, drums, drums, drums,
Drums, drums, drums, --
From the tapping and the rapping on the drums.

II
Feel the solemn fun’ral drums,
Deathly drums!
How much pain and mourning with their ghostly rhythm comes!
Through the ghoulish fog of morn’
How they sing their song forlorn! –
From the melancholy strokes
In cold accord,
Such a passion it unyokes
In the guilty coffin-bearer who uncloaks
The fallen lord!
Oh, from out those low anthems,
Such a life of bravery into heaven welcomes!
How it hums
And becomes
A sinking dirge which benumbs
And silently succumbs
To the looming, deeply booming
Fun’ral drums, drums. drums, --
Oh, the drums, drums, drums, drums,
Drums, drums, drums,
To the greeting of the beating of the drums!

III
Feel the proud victory drums --
Parade drums!
How much pride and glory with their joyful rhythm comes!
Through the homeland’s golden streets,
How they march to lively beats,
Singing songs of battles won,
Of plunders gained a ton,
Ne’er defeat!
In a clamorous revealing of the nature of the choir,
In a vibrant exhaltation of the birthplace of the choir,
Singing higher, higher, higher,
With a deep and burning fire,
Now the crowd is moving faster
To the booming of the pastor
Through the streets of a war-torn land.
Oh, the drums, drums, drums!
Never minding of the sums
Of the dead!
How they sing of life and death,
And now how the sons of Seth
Are so dancing on the homeland’s golden streets!
And the people clearly see
By the clanging
And the banging
That they can be now set free;
And the people surely know
From the rapping
And the tapping,
That their vict’ry’s now secure
Through the dying and the crying now comes life, say the drums--
Say the drums,--
Say the drums, drums, drums, drums,
Drums, drums, drums--
Spoke the fates so softly laughing through the drums!