The word “lour” is deployed with considerable versatility in literary texts where it primarily conjures images of dark, approaching clouds and a foreboding mood. Poets and playwrights alike use it to evoke gloom and imminent storm, as in the depiction of northern-night clouds that lour over a ship in tempest ([1]) or the melancholy skies that seem to frown upon battlefields ([2], [3]). In the hands of Shakespeare, it becomes a rhetorical device questioning the nature of justice ([4]), while Robert Burns repeatedly employs it to underscore the transient hardships of life ([5], [6]). Occasionally, its usage even extends to more colloquial or metaphorical registers, indicating a shift in tone or circumstance ([7]). Overall, “lour” remains a powerful, multifaceted term that enhances the somber and ominous ambience in a range of literary works.