JOHN KEATS

Spirit of a winter's night;

When the soundless earth is muffled,

And the caked snow is shuffled

From the ploughboy's heavy shoon ;

When the Night doth meet the Noon

In a dark conspiracy

To banish Even from her sky.

Sit thee there, and send abroad,

With a mind self-overawed,

Fancy, high-commission'd : send her !

She has vassals to attend her:

She will bring, in spite of frost,

Beauties that the earth hath lost;

She will bring thee, all together,

All delights of summer weather;

All the buds and bells of May,

From dewy sward or thorny spray ;

All the heaped Autumn's wealth,

With a still, mysterious stealth:

She will mix these pleasures up

Like three fit wines in a cup,

And thou shalt quaff it : thou shalt heat

Distant harvest-carols clear ;

Rustle of the reaped corn ;

Sweet birds antheming the morn :

And, in the same moment hark !

'Tis the early April lark,

Or the rooks, with busy caw,

Foraging for sticks and straw.

Thou shalt, at one glance, behold

The daisy and the marigold ;

White-plumed lilies, and the first

Hedge-grown primrose that hath burst;

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