Even Metal Heads are Well Read

She seems dressed in all the rings
Of past fatalities
So fragile yet so devious
She continues to see it
Climatic hands that press
Her temples and my chest
Enter the night that she came home
Forever

Oh (She's the only one that makes me sad)

She is everything and more
The solemn hypnotic
My Dahlia bathed in possession
She is home to me

I get nervous, perverse, when I see her it's worse
But the stress is astounding
It's now or never she's coming home
Forever

Oh (She's the only one that makes me sad)

Hard to say what caught my attention
Fixed and crazy, Aphid attraction
Carve my name in my face, to recognize
Such a pheromone cult to terrorize

I won't let this build up inside of me
I won't let this build up inside of me
I won't let this build up inside of me
I won't let this build up inside of me

(Yeah!)

(oh-oh)
I'm a slave, and I am a master
No restraints and, unchecked collectors
I exist through my need, to self oblige
She is something in me, that I despise

I won't let this build up inside of me
I won't let this build up inside of me
I won't let this build up inside of me
I won't let this build up inside of me

I won't let this build up inside of me
I won't let this build up inside of me
I won't let this build up inside of me
I won't let this build up inside of me

SHE ISN'T REAL!
I CAN'T MAKE HER REAL!
SHE ISN'T REAL!
I CAN'T MAKE HER REAL!

She isn't real (She isn't real)
I can't make her real (can't make her real)
She isn't real (She isn't real)
I can't make her real (can't make her real)

This is a song, Vermilion, by the metal band Slipknot. Even in the counterculture of the "metal heads," literary references are rampant and force alternative meaning and depth into the songs and the over all style. "Rings of past fatalities" seem to me a reference to Dante's Inferno. "The night she came home forever" can easily be interpreted as a reference to Browning's poem "Porphyria's Lover," and the final stanza can be interpreted as evidence to support this claim. "Dahlia" clearly refers to Black Dahlia, the Massachusetts murder victim who inspired a vast amount of literature and film. The Dahlia is also a flower, and the phrase "Fixed and crazy, Aphid attraction" is a poetic notion that compares her to the flower, and him, to a bug, an aphid, that cannot help but ravish her. Think on the phrase "Such a pheromone cult to terrorize." It's stunning and odd, but is open to interpretation. Since pheromones are what aids attraction, and a cult is a collection of people who partake in nonstandard thinking or practice, often times harmful ones, then how do these words offer different meanings depending to the reader? "I'm a slave, and I am a master" is a clear Biblical reference. The list goes on infinitely; it is far longer than the word requirement allows. My point is, even the most obscure of cultures look to classical poetry and literature to influence their work. Also, signs are everywhere waiting to be analyzed. Before you write a song off as noise, observe and question the content. It's shocking.