Canto XV
To-night the winds began to riseAnd roar from yonder dropping day:The last red leaf is whirl’d away,The rooks are blown about the skies;
The forest crack’d, the waters curl’d,The cattle huddled on the lea;And wildly dash’d on tower and treeThe sunbeam strikes along the world:
And but for fancies, which averThat all thy motions gently passAthwart a plane of molten glass,I scarce could brook the strain and stir
That makes the barren branches loud;And but for fear it is not so,The wild unrest that lives in woeWould dote and pore on yonder cloud
That rises upward always higher,And onward drags a labouring breast,And topples round the dreary west,A looming bastion fringed with fire.