Thunder

Night storms are part of southern summer.  Torrential wind-whipped rain pours, lit up by lightening dancing with its sound soul mate, thunder.   Typically my sleep is deep enough that I only know the storm occurred by the puddles and perky plants of morning.  But, as last night, there happen the occasions of thunder that so shake that they wake me.

Dictionary.com defines the noun thunder.
1.  a loud, resounding noise produced by the explosive expansion of air heated by a lightening discharge.

Also at dictionary.com The American Heritage Science Dictionary published by Houghton Mifflin in 2002 explained thunder.  “Thunderstorms occur when moist air near the ground becomes heated, especially in the summer, and rises, forming cumulonimbus clouds that produce precipitation.  Electrical charges accumulate at the bases of the clouds until lightening is discharged.  Air in the path of lightening expands as a result of being heated, causing thunder.” 

I like to look at kids’ sites for explanations of science.  They typically help me understand what is happening in the physical world without phrases like “Sound velocity is proportional to the square root of temperature” which I encountered on Wikipedia.  Having been awake most of the night I cannot comprehend that sentence right now.

The science of thunder, however stated, has evolved over time.  Early theories of thunder and lightening involved angry gods wielding mighty power to keep man in his place.  The vacuum theory I learned in the way back nineteen-eighties whereby lightening produced a vacuum along its path and thunder was due to the air rushing into the vacuum has also been replaced.  Contemporary science says thunder is a kind of sonic shock wave.  The sudden increase in pressure and temperature from lightening produces super-fast expansion of adjacent air.  The expansion of air moves faster than the speed of sound making waves that result in something similar to a sonic boom. These sound waves produce the clap, crack, or peal of thunder.  The rumbling is sound vibrations bouncing around among clouds, the ground, and such.

Isn’t nature grand?  It offers so much awe-filled inspiration.  Isn’t the internet also grand?  I can think about something, look it up, learn, write and share with the world all before the sun comes up.  Today’s awesomeness truly began with thunder. 

Lightening’s Voice

thief of summer night rest

clapping, slapping, crashing

expanding into what seems

blank space, burned hot

heavenly electric pull

smashing hands of air

particles and remaining charge

speeding toward boom

with abandon accompanying

light of positives and negatives

draw violent beauty far

rumbling, trembling, calling

babes to fear awakening

they hear loud, divining

harm comes of sonic sound

fierce flash companion, sky

storm percussion stomp

of Zeus or Thor washed away

torrential tears, age tells us

it passes as it always has

power present, pound and shake

the foundation, sleepy minds

try to believe it will blow away

tired stubble dark eyes wide

with wonder and livid sighs