Paul Laurence Dunbar

Changing Time

The cloud looked in at the window,

And said to the day, "Be dark!"

And the roguish rain tapped hard on the pane,

To stifle the song of the lark.


The wind sprang up in the tree tops

And shrieked with a voice of death,

But the rough-voiced breeze, that shook the trees,

Was touched with a violet's breath.