To a Thunder-Cloud
Oh, melancholy fragment of the nightDrawing thy lazy web against the sun,Thou shouldst have waited till the day was doneWith kindred glooms to build thy fane aright,Sublime amid the ruins of the light!But thus to shape our glories one by oneWith fearful hands, ere we had well begunTo look for shadows--even in the bright!Yet may we charm a lesson from thy breast,A secret wisdom from thy folds of thunder:There is a wind that cometh from the westWill rend thy tottering piles of gloom asunder,And fling thee ruinous along the grass,To sparkle on us as our footsteps pass!
Words in this poem
- fane n.
- A temple; a place consecrated to religion; a church. [L. fanum a place dedicated to some deity, a sanctuary, fr. fari to speak. See Fame.]
- aright adv.
- Rightly; correctly; in a right way or form; without mistake or crime; as, to worship God aright. [Pref. a- + right.]
- amid prep.
- In the midst or middle of; surrounded or encompassed by; among. [OE. amidde, amiddes, on midden, AS. on middan, in the middle, fr. midde the middle. The s is an adverbial ending, originally marking the genitive; the t is a la]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
To a Thunder-Cloud is in the public domain. This text is taken from The poetical works of George MacDonald in two volumes — Volume 2, Project Gutenberg ebook #9984; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: George MacDonald, To a Thunder-Cloud, in A Microcosm in Terza Rima, and Other Poems (1893), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #9984, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/macdonald-poems/to-a-thunder-cloud.html, id L22477.
Form and metre
To a Thunder-Cloud is 14 lines in a single stanza. It rhymes ABBAABBACDCDEE. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 92%).
See other poems in iambic pentameter.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Rhyme words, stanza by stanza
The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.
- 1 ABBAABBACDCDEE nightA · sunB · doneB · arightA · lightA · oneB · begunB · brightA · breastC · thunderD · westC · asunderD · grassE · passE
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against iambic pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Oh, melancholy fragment of the night | 10 | ·/˘·˘/˘··· |
| Drawing thy lazy web against the sun, | 10 | /˘·/˘····· |
| Thou shouldst have waited till the day was done | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| With kindred glooms to build thy fane aright, | 10 | ·/˘·····˘/ |
| Sublime amid the ruins of the light! | 10 | ˘/˘/·/˘··· |
| But thus to shape our glories one by one | 10 | ····//˘··· |
| With fearful hands, ere we had well begun | 10 | ·/˘·····˘/ |
| To look for shadows--even in the bright! | 10 | ···/·/˘··· |
| Yet may we charm a lesson from thy breast, | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| A secret wisdom from thy folds of thunder: | 11 | ·/˘/˘····/˘ |
| There is a wind that cometh from the west | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| Will rend thy tottering piles of gloom asunder, | 11 | ···/˘···˘/˘ |
| And fling thee ruinous along the grass, | 10 | ···/˘˘˘/·· |
| To sparkle on us as our footsteps pass! | 10 | ·/˘···//·· |
The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.