When in the dreary hour of decline

[adonais]

A sonnet.

When in the dreary hour of decline
I sit and think on life’s untrodden ways,
And how they left, bereft of their sublime,
My sum of waking hours and all days;
When fond remembrances shall cease to bear
The yoke of blissful sleep, and every dream
Reveal thy comely countenance: I fear
The end of night, and dawn’s dispelling beam.
Thus like a weeping willow I becloud
My soul with tears. Yet do I tend a space
Where even silence seems too like a shroud
Of woe—And wistfully I lift my gaze
Above the emerald boughs, where skylarks play
In warbled rhymes, entreating me to stay.