When in the outer air, I felt as one
Fresh startled from a dream, wherein the sun
Had dying left the earth a dingy, dun
Annihilation. The nightjar
Only thrilled the air afar:

No other sound was there: a muffled breeze
Crept in the shrubs, and shuddered up the trees,
Then sought the ghost-white vapour of the leas,
Where one long sheet of dismal cloud
Swathed the distance in a shroud.

A solitary eye of cold stern light
Stared threateningly beyond the Western height,
Wrapped in the closing shadows of the night;
And all the peaceful earth had slept
But that eye stern vigil kept.

I wandered wearily I knew not where;
Up windy downs far-stretching, bleak and bare;
Through swamps that soddened under stagnant air;
In blackest woods and brambled mesh,
Thorny bushes tore my flesh:

Amid the ripening corn I heard it sigh,
Hollow and sad, as night crawled sluggishly:
Hollow and sadly sighed the corn while I
Moved darkly in the midst, a blight
Darkening more the hateful night.