Now thin mists temper the slow-ripening beams Of the September sun: his golden gleams On gaudy flowers shine, that prank the rows Of high-grown hollyhocks, and all tall shows That Autumn flaunteth in his bushy bowers; Where tomtits, hanging from the drooping heads Of giant sunflowers, peck the nutty seeds; And in the feathery aster bees on wing Seize and set free the honied flowers, Till thousand stars leap with their visiting: While ever across the path mazily flit, Unpiloted in the sun, The dreamy butterflies With dazzling colours powdered and soft glooms, White, black and crimson stripes, and peacock eyes, Or on chance flowers sit, With idle effort plundering one by one The nectaries of deepest-throated blooms. With gentle flaws the western breeze Into the garden saileth, Scarce here and there stirring the single trees, For his sharpness he vaileth: So long a comrade of the bearded corn, Now from the stubbles whence the shocks are borne, O’er dewy lawns he turns to stray, As mindful of the kisses and soft play Wherewith he enamoured the light-hearted May, Ere he deserted her; Lover of fragrance, and too late repents; Nor more of heavy hyacinth now may drink, Nor spicy pink, Nor summer’s rose, nor garnered lavender, But the few lingering scents Of streakèd pea, and gillyflower, and stocks Of courtly purple, and aromatic phlox. And at all times to hear are drowsy tones Of dizzy flies, and humming drones, With sudden flap of pigeon wings in the sky, Or the wild cry Of thirsty rooks, that scour ascare The distant blue, to watering as they fare With creaking pinions, or—on business bent, If aught their ancient polity displease,— Come gathering to their colony, and there Settling in ragged parliament, Some stormy council hold in the high trees. 5 So sweet love seemed that April morn, When first we kissed beside the thorn, So strangely sweet, it was not strange We thought that love could never change. But I can tell—let truth be told— That love will change in growing old; Though day by day is nought to see, So delicate his motions be. And in the end ’twill come to pass Quite to forget what once he was, Nor even in fancy to recall The pleasure that was all in all. His little spring, that sweet we found, So deep in summer floods is drowned, I wonder, bathed in joy complete, How love so young could be so sweet. 6 LARKS What voice of gladness, hark! In heaven is ringing? From the sad fields the lark Is upward winging.