A Storm in the Mountains
A Storm in the Mountains is a string quartet based on a poem of the same name by one of Australia’s earliest poets;
Charles Harpur (1813 – 1868).
With the gothic drama of Coleridge and Wordsworth’s observance of nature, the poem tells of a lone boy’s afternoon, in charge of a herd, whilst witnessing a terrifying thunderstorm. Capturing the sights and sounds of the Australian bush in amongst the mountains it contains references to various birdcalls, a bullfrog and ominous dingo howls. The drama is heightened with an eagle struck by lightning and later a huge tree shattered also by lightning. After the storm passes peace returns with the sound of “lessening torrents”… “watching earth’s happiness with quiet mind”.
A lonely boy, far venturing from home
Out on the half-wild herd’s faint tracks I roam;
Mid rock-browned mountains, which with stony frown
Glare into haggard chasms deep adown;
A rude and craggy world, the prospect lies
Bounded in circuit by the bending skies.
Now at some clear pool scooped out by the shocks
Of rain- floods plunging from the upper rocks
Whose liquid disc in its undimpled rest.....
.....Fast the dim legions of the muttering storm
Throng denser, or protruding columns form;
While splashing forward from their cloudy lair,
Convolving flames, like scouting dragons, glare:
Low thunders follow, labouring up the sky;
And as fore-running blasts go blaring by,
At once the forest, with a mighty stir,
Bows, as in homage to the thunderer!....
