After dark vapours have oppressed our plains

After dark vapours have oppressed our plains by John Keats

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.

This work published before January 1, 1923 is in the public domain worldwide because the author died at least 100 years ago.