A threatening aspect, ominously dark;

Enveloping the heaven's canopy

In lowering shadow and portentous gloom;

In pall of ambient obscurity.

The fork-ed lightnings ramify and play

Upon a background of sepulchral black;

The growling thunders rumble a reply

Of detonation awful and profound,

To every corruscation's vivid gleam;

In deep crescendo and fortissimo,

In quavering tremolo and stately fugue

Echoes, reverberates and dies away!

But soon the sun, with smiling radiance,

Through orifice, through rift and aperture,

Invades the storm, and dissipates the clouds,

Which scatter, cowering and ephemeral,

Hugging the cliffs, and o'er the dire abyss

Hover, in fleecy, ever changing form,

And in a transient season disappear;

Vanish, as man must vanish, and are gone.

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