Status Updates From Corabia Zeiței Ishtar

And ye pause at the farthest door?
As though they never had been, he said—
Utterly passed as the pulse of the dead!
Then tread on lightly with nothing to mourn!
Shall he who had nothing fear for the score?
Ah—better be dead than alive, he said—
But best is ne'er to be born!

I'm expecting this to be overwrought to the point of being intolerable, but hoping to be positively surprised.