Frozen Lightning Over Spanish Moss and Oak

Thick strands of Spanish moss drape heavily from the gnarled branches of a live oak, their gray-green fibers catching the dim, diffused light of a stormy evening. Above the canopy, bands of fast-moving clouds race across the sky, their undersides bruised with the approaching night. A jagged bolt of lightning hangs suspended in mid-air, its white-blue veins branching sharply against the darkening gray, appearing solid and unmoving like a sculpture of ice. Rain falls in steady, visible curtains, blurring the distant horizon where the sun dips low, casting a faint, watery glow beneath the storm. The wet bark of the oak glistens, reflecting the frozen electric branch that cuts through the air above.