A moment the wild swallows like a flight

Of withered gust-caught leaves, serenely high,

Toss in the windrack up the muttering sky.

The leaves hang still. Above the weird twilight,

The hurrying centres of the storm unite

And spreading with huge trunk and rolling fringe,

Each wheeled upon its own tremendous hinge,

Tower darkening on. And now from heaven’s height,

With the long roar of elm trees swept and swayed,

And pelted waters, on the vanished plain

Plunges the blast. Behind the wild white flash

That splits abroad the pealing thunder-crash,

Over bleared fields and gardens disarrayed,

Column on column comes the drenching rain.