O GRIP the earth, ye forest trees, <br />Grip well the earth to-night, <br />The Storm-God rides across the seas <br />To greet the morning light. <br /> <br />All clouds that wander through the skies <br />Are tangled in his net, <br />The frightened stars have shut their eyes, <br />The breakers fume and fret. <br /> <br />The birds that cheer the woods all day <br />Now tremble in their nests, <br />The giant branches round them sway, <br />The wild wind never rests. <br /> <br />The squirrel and the cunning fox <br />Have hurried to their holes, <br />Far off, like distant earthquake shocks, <br />The muffled thunder rolls. <br /> <br />In scores of hidden woodland dells, <br />Where no rough winds can harm, <br />The timid wild-flowers toss their bells <br />In reasonless alarm. <br /> <br />Only the mountains rear their forms, <br />Silent and grim and bold; <br />To them the voices of the storms <br />Are as a tale re-told. <br /> <br />They saw the stars in heaven hung, <br />They heard the great Sea's birth, <br />They know the ancient pain that wrung <br />The entrails of the Earth. <br /> <br />Sprung from great Nature's royal lines, <br />They share her deep repose,– <br />Their rugged shoulders robed in pines, <br />Their foreheads crowned with snows. <br /> <br />But now there comes a lightning flash, <br />And now on hill and plain <br />The charging clouds in fury dash, <br />And blind the world with rain.<br /><br />Frederick George Scott<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-storm-95/
