It is the hour when from the boughs
The nightingale's high note is heard;
It is the hour when lovers' vows
Seem sweet in every whispered word;
And gentle winds, and waters near,
Make music to the lonely ear.
Each flower the dews have lightly wet,
And in the sky the stars are met,
And on the wave is deeper blue,
And on the leaf a browner hue,
And in the heaven that clear obscure,
So softly dark, and darkly pure.
Which follows the decline of day,
As twilight melts beneath the moon away.
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Day's lustrous eyes grow heavy in sweet death.
Day's lustrous eyes grow heavy in sweet death.
I was heavy with the even,
When she lit her glimmering tapers
Round the day's dead sanctities.
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I was heavy with the even,
When she lit her glimmering tapers
Round the day's dead sanctities.
I laughed in the morning's eyes.
Hark! that's the nightingale,
Telling the self-same tale
Her song told when this ancient earth was young:
read more
Hark! that's the nightingale,
Telling the self-same tale
Her song told when this ancient earth was young:
So echoes answered when her song was sung
In the first wooded vale.
Fly not yet, 'tis just the hour
When pleasure, like the midnight flower
That scorns the eye read more
Fly not yet, 'tis just the hour
When pleasure, like the midnight flower
That scorns the eye of vulgar light,
Begins to bloom for sons of night.
I have head the nightingale herself.
I have head the nightingale herself.
To the red rising moon, and loud and deep
The nightingale is singing from the steep.
To the red rising moon, and loud and deep
The nightingale is singing from the steep.
Hark! ah, the nightingale--
The tawny-throated!
Hark from that moonlit cedar what a burst!
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Hark! ah, the nightingale--
The tawny-throated!
Hark from that moonlit cedar what a burst!
What triumph! hark!--what pain!
. . . .
Again--thou hearest?
Eternal passion!
Eternal pain!
Hath thy heart within thee burned,
At evening's calm and holy hour?
Hath thy heart within thee burned,
At evening's calm and holy hour?
Now came still evening on; and twilight gray
Had in her sober livery all things clad:
Silence read more
Now came still evening on; and twilight gray
Had in her sober livery all things clad:
Silence accompanied; for beast and bird,
They to they grassy couch, these to their nests,
Were slunk, all but the wakeful nightingale.
