Fireworks

The roar of battle rends the moonlit sky
With distant thunder as of cannons booming.
And bursting, crashing, popping salvos fly
Above the roar, the whirr of rockets zooming.

The din deceives, for when it yields to sight
A fire-dance fills the sky whose salvo jolts
Blithe, awestruck smiles to gasps of sheer delight
That brave the thunder to behold its bolts:

Starbursts of crimson, purple, orange, and green;
A blinding flash of white; a gold cascade
Or silver—sparkling fountains that careen
Like champagne spritz; bright clustered stars bright-rayed;

Or fire-sprites swirling in a spiral gyre,
Whistling as they whirl into nothingness;
Volcanic founts of sparks, pillars of fire
Ascending as they flare and incandesce.

The bursting fires so dazzlingly arrayed
By art into this eye-bewitching show
Rain in bombs and roar in the cannonade
That levels cities and lays legions low.

And in their thunder rings the din of war,
Echoes that inexorably portend
The clash of battle never looming far,
And bid the bursting sky-borne fires descend.

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