ALL the long day the vapours played At blindfold in the city streets, Their elfin fingers caught and stayed The sunbeams, as they wound their sheets Into a filmy barricade 'Twixt earth and where the sunlight beats. A vagrant band of mischiefs these, With wings of grey and cobweb gown; They live along the edge of seas, And creeping out on foot of down, They chase and frolic, frisk and tease At blind-man's buff with all the town. And when at eventide the sun Breaks with a glory through their grey, The vapour-fairies, one by one, Outspread their wings and float away In clouds of colouring, that run Wine-like along the rim of day. Athwart the beauty and the breast Of purpling airs they twirl and twist, Then float away to some far rest, Leaving the skies all colour-kiss't— A glorious and a golden West That greets the Lifting of the Mist. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...CHERRY BLOSSOMS BLOWING IN WEST BLOWING SNOW by JAMES GALVIN TO ABRAHAM LINCOLN by GEORGIA DOUGLAS JOHNSON READING WHITMAN IN A TOILET STALL by TIMOTHY LIU WINTER GARDEN THEATRE by EDGAR LEE MASTERS CONRAD AT TWILIGHT by JOHN CROWE RANSOM WE HAVE GONE THROUGH GREAT ROOMS TOGETHER by CARL SANDBURG ELEGY: THE LAMENT OF EDWARD BLASTOCK; FOR RICHARD ROWLEY by EDITH SITWELL |