And instantly follows the rattling thunder

As if some cloud-crag, split asunder,

Fell, splintering with a ruinous crash,

On the earth, which crouches in silence under;

And now a solid gray wall of rain

Shuts off the landscape, mile by mile;

For a breath’s space I see the blue wood again,

And, ere the next heart-beat, the wind-hurled pile,

That seemed but now a league aloof,

Bursts rattling over the sun-parched roof;