TO THE AUTUMNAL MOON

Mild Splendour of the various-vested Night!

　Mother of wildly-working visions! hail!

I watch thy gliding, while with wat'ry light

　Thy weak eye glimmers thro' a fleecy veil;

And when thou lovest thy pale orb to shroud

　Behind the gather'd blackness lost on high;

And when thou dartest from the wind-rent cloud

　Thy placid lightning o'er th' awaken'd sky.

Ah such is Hope! as changeful and as fair!

　Now dimly peering on the wistful sight;

Now hid behind the dragon-wing'd Despair:

　But soon emerging in her radiant might

She o'er the sorrow-clouded breast of Care

　Sails, like a meteor kindling in its flight.

1788