The Rain of Blood

In that dark year an angry rain came down

Blood-red upon the hot stones of the town.

Beneath the pelting of that liquid drought

No garden stood, no shattered stalk could sprout,

As from a sunless sky all day it rained

And men came in from streets of terror stained

With that unnatural ichor. Under night

Impatient lovers did not quench the light,

But listening heard above each other's breath

That sound the dying heard in rooms of death.

Each loudly asked abroad, and none dared tell

What omen in that burning torrent fell.

And all night long we lay, while overhead

The drops rained down as if the heavens bled;

And every dawn we woke to hear the sound,

And all men knew that they could stanch the wound,

But each looked out and cursed the sickened town,

The guilty roofs on which the rain came down.