Sonnet [Dark And More Dark The Shades Of Evening Fell]

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Title:     Sonnet [Dark And More Dark The Shades Of Evening Fell]
Author: William Wordsworth [More Titles by Wordsworth]

This sonnet was written after a journey across the Hambleton Hills, Yorkshire. Wordsworth says: "It was composed October 4th, 1802, after a journey on a day memorable to me--the day of my marriage. The horizon commanded by those hills is most magnificent." Dorothy Wordsworth, describing the sky-prospect, says: "Far off from us in the western sky we saw the shapes of castles, ruins among groves, a great spreading wood, rocks and single trees, a minster with its tower unusually distinct, minarets in another quarter, and a round Grecian temple also; the colours of the shy of a bright gray, and the forms of a sober gray, with dome."

Dark and more dark the shades of evening fell;
The wished-for point was reached--but at an hour
When little could be gained from that rich dower
Of Prospect, whereof many thousands tell.
Yet did the glowing west with marvellous power
Salute us; there stood Indian citadel,
Temple of Greece, and minster with its tower
Substantially expressed--a place for bell
Or clock to toll from! Many a tempting isle,
With groves that never were imagined, lay
'Mid seas how steadfast! objects all for the eye
Of silent rapture, but we felt the while
We should forget them; they are of the sky
And from our earthly memory fade away.

[The end]
William Wordsworth's poem: Sonnet [Dark And More Dark The Shades Of Evening Fell]

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