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All Site ContentMidsummer Night's DreamAct 1Scene 1
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"Brief as the lightning"
Metaphor
Act 1,
Scene 1
Lines 132-149

An explanation of the Lysander’s lightning metaphor in Act 1, Scene 1 of myShakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

Lysander

Ay me! For aught that I could ever read,
Could ever hear by tale or history,
The course of true love never did run smooth,
But either it was different in blood —

Hermia

O cross! Too high to be enthralled to low.

Lysander

Or else misgrafted in respect of years —

Hermia

O spite! Too old to be engaged to young.

Lysander

Or merit stood upon the choice of friends —

Hermia

O hell! To choose love by another's eyes.

Lysander

Or if there were a sympathy in choice,
War, death, or sickness did lay siege to it,
Making it momentary as a sound,
Swift as a shadow, short as any dream,
Brief as the lightning in the collied night
That in a spleen unfolds both heaven and earth,
And ere a man hath power to say "Behold!"
The jaws of darkness do devour it up.
So quick bright things come to confusion.

Love is like a lightning bolt — briefly illuminating the darkness (“collied night”), then suddenly disappearing.

References: 

https://www.pexels.com/photo/photo-of-lightning-1114690/