And rending from their brows the aureole,
The saints blaspheming die in their despair.
The sun senescent, near his final goal,
Casts from his bloodshot eye one baleful glare,
Ere yet the heavens vanish like a scroll.
Each living thing shall perish foul or fair,
The flood will top the tallest mountain chain,
For vengeance cometh on and will not spare.
For twenty days and nights through wind and rain,
The raven’s midnight wing, cleaving the waste,