Album: Seraphine... Far Gone Gleam (2000)

After Dark Vapours Have Oppressed Our Plains

[John Keats poem]

After dark vapours have oppressed 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, relieving from 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.