Ode to Evening

If aught of oaten stop, or pastoral song,May hope, chaste Eve, to soothe thy modest ear,Like thy own brawling springs,Thy springs, and dying gales;

O Nymph reserved, while now the bright-hair'd sunSits in yon western tent, whose cloudy skirts,With brede ethereal wove,O'erhang his wavy bed:

Now air is hush'd, save where the weak-eyed batWith short shrill shriek flits by on leathern wing;Or where the beetle windsHis small but sullen horn,

As oft he rises 'midst the twilight path,Against the pilgrim borne in heedless hum:Now teach me, maid composed,To breathe some soften'd strain,

Whose numbers, stealing through thy darkening vale,May not unseemly with its stillness suit;As, musing slow, I hailThy genial loved return!

For when thy folding-star arising showsHis paly circlet, at his warning lampThe fragrant Hours, and ElvesWho slept in buds the day,

And many a Nymph who wreathes her brows with sedge,And sheds the freshening dew, and, lovelier still,The pensive Pleasures sweet,Prepare thy shadowy car.

Then let me rove some wild and heathy scene;Or find some ruin, 'midst its dreary dells,Whose walls more awful nodBy thy religious gleams.

Or, if chill blustering winds, or driving rain,Prevent my willing feet, be mine the hut,That, from the mountain's side,Views wilds, and swelling floods,

And hamlets brown, and dim-discover'd spires;And hears their simple bell, and marks o'er allThy dewy fingers drawThe gradual dusky veil.

While Spring shall pour his showers, as oft he wont,And bathe thy breathing tresses, meekest Eve!While Summer loves to sportBeneath thy lingering light;

While sallow Autumn fills thy lap with leaves;Or Winter, yelling through the troublous air,Affrights thy shrinking train,And rudely rends thy robes;

So long, regardful of thy quiet rule,Shall Fancy, Friendship, Science, smiling Peace,Thy gentlest influence own,And love thy favourite name!