Iv

Night

There is a booming in the forest boughs; Tremendous feet seem trampling through the trees: The storm is at his wildman revelries, And earth and heaven echo his carouse. Night reels with tumult; and, from out her house Of cloud, the moon looks,--like a face one sees In nightmare,--hurrying, with pale eyes that freeze, Stooping above with white, malignant brows. The isolated oak upon the hill, That seemed, at sunset, in terrific lands A Titan head black in a sea of blood, Now seems a monster harp, whose wild strings thrill To the vast fingering of innumerable hands-- Spirits of tempest and of solitude.