Rayless, and pathless; and the icy earth

Swung blind and blackening in the moonless air;

Morn came, and went,—and came, and brought no day.

The world was void;

The populous and the powerful was a lump,—

Seasonless, herbless, treeless, manless, lifeless,—

A lump of death—a chaos of hard clay.

The rivers, lakes, and ocean, all stood still;

And nothing stirred within their silent depths:

Ships, sailorless, lay rotting on the sea;