Sonnet + 

After Dark Vapours + 

After dark vapours have oppress’d our plains + 

For a long dreary season, comes a day + 

Born of the gentle South, and clears away + 

From the sick heavens all unseemly stains. + 

The anxious month, relieved its pains, + 

Takes as a long-lost right the feel of May; + 

The eyelids with the passing coolness play, + 

Like rose leaves with the drip of summer rains. + 

And calmest thoughts come round us; as, of leaves + 

Budding,⁠—fruit ripening in stillness,⁠—Autumn suns + 

Smiling at eve upon the quiet sheaves,⁠— + 

Sweet Sappho’s cheek,⁠—a sleeping infant’s breath,⁠— + 

The gradual sand that through an hour-glass runs,⁠— + 

A woodland rivulet,⁠—a Poet’s death. + 