Poems of the Past and the Present

Part 1

POEMS OF THE PAST AND THE PRESENT

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BY THOMAS HARDY

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MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED ST. MARTIN’S STREET, LONDON 1919

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COPYRIGHT

“Wessex Poems”: First Edition, Crown 8vo, 1898. New Edition 1903. First Pocket Edition June 1907. Reprinted January 1909, 1913

“Poems, Past and Present”: First edition 1901 (dated 1902) Second Edition 1903. First Pocket Edition June 1907 Reprinted January 1908, 1913, 1918, 1919

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CONTENTS

PAGE V.R. 1819–1901 231 WAR POEMS— EMBARCATION 235 DEPARTURE 237 THE COLONEL’S SOLILOQUY 239 THE GOING OF THE BATTERY 242 AT THE WAR OFFICE 245 A CHRISTMAS GHOST-STORY 247 THE DEAD DRUMMER 249 A WIFE IN LONDON 251 THE SOULS OF THE SLAIN 253 SONG OF THE SOLDIERS’ WIVES 260 THE SICK GOD 263 POEMS OF PILGRIMAGE— GENOA AND THE MEDITERRANEAN 269 SHELLEY’S SKYLARK 272 IN THE OLD THEATRE, FIESOLE 274 ROME: ON THE PALATINE 276 ,, BUILDING A NEW STREET IN THE 278 ANCIENT QUARTER ,, THE VATICAN: SALA DELLE MUSE 280 ,, AT THE PYRAMID OF CESTIUS 283 LAUSANNE: IN GIBBON’S OLD GARDEN 286 ZERMATT: TO THE MATTERHORN 288 THE BRIDGE OF LODI 290 ON AN INVITATION TO THE UNITED 295 STATES MISCELLANEOUS POEMS— THE MOTHER MOURNS 299 “I SAID TO LOVE” 305 A COMMONPLACE DAY 307 AT A LUNAR ECLIPSE 310 THE LACKING SENSE 312 TO LIFE 316 DOOM AND SHE 318 THE PROBLEM 321 THE SUBALTERNS 323 THE SLEEP-WORKER 325 THE BULLFINCHES 327 GOD-FORGOTTEN 329 THE BEDRIDDEN PEASANT TO AN 333 UNKNOWING GOD BY THE EARTH’S CORPSE 336 MUTE OPINION 339 TO AN UNBORN PAUPER CHILD 341 TO FLOWERS FROM ITALY IN WINTER 344 ON A FINE MORNING 346 TO LIZBIE BROWNE 348 SONG OF HOPE 352 THE WELL-BELOVED 354 HER REPROACH 358 THE INCONSISTENT 360 A BROKEN APPOINTMENT 362 “BETWEEN US NOW” 364 “HOW GREAT MY GRIEF” 366 “I NEED NOT GO” 367 THE COQUETTE, AND AFTER 369 A SPOT 371 LONG PLIGHTED 373 THE WIDOW 375 AT A HASTY WEDDING 378 THE DREAM-FOLLOWER 379 HIS IMMORTALITY 380 THE TO-BE-FORGOTTEN 382 WIVES IN THE SERE 385 THE SUPERSEDED 387 AN AUGUST MIDNIGHT 389 THE CAGED THRUSH FREED AND HOME 391 AGAIN BIRDS AT WINTER NIGHTFALL 393 THE PUZZLED GAME-BIRDS 394 WINTER IN DURNOVER FIELD 395 THE LAST CHRYSANTHEMUM 397 THE DARKLING THRUSH 399 THE COMET AT YALBURY OR YELL’HAM 402 MAD JUDY 403 A WASTED ILLNESS 405 A MAN 408 THE DAME OF ATHELHALL 412 THE SEASONS OF HER YEAR 416 THE MILKMAID 418 THE LEVELLED CHURCHYARD 420 THE RUINED MAID 422 THE RESPECTABLE BURGHER ON “THE 425 HIGHER CRITICISM” ARCHITECTURAL MASKS 428 THE TENANT-FOR-LIFE 430 THE KING’S EXPERIMENT 432 THE TREE: AN OLD MAN’S STORY 435 HER LATE HUSBAND 439 THE SELF-UNSEEING 441 DE PROFUNDIS I. 443 DE PROFUNDIS II. 445 DE PROFUNDIS III. 448 THE CHURCH-BUILDER 451 THE LOST PYX: A MEDIÆVAL LEGEND 457 TESS’S LAMENT 462 THE SUPPLANTER: A TALE 465 IMITATIONS, ETC.— SAPPHIC FRAGMENT 473 CATULLUS: XXXI 474 AFTER SCHILLER 476 SONG: FROM HEINE 477 FROM VICTOR HUGO 479 CARDINAL BEMBO’S EPITAPH ON RAPHAEL 480 RETROSPECT— “I HAVE LIVED WITH SHADES” 483 MEMORY AND I 486 ἈΓΝΩΣΤΩι ΘΕΩι. 489

V.R. 1819–1901 A REVERIE

MOMENTS the mightiest pass uncalendared, And when the Absolute In backward Time outgave the deedful word Whereby all life is stirred: “Let one be born and throned whose mould shall constitute The norm of every royal-reckoned attribute,” No mortal knew or heard. But in due days the purposed Life outshone— Serene, sagacious, free; —Her waxing seasons bloomed with deeds well done, And the world’s heart was won . . . Yet may the deed of hers most bright in eyes to be Lie hid from ours—as in the All-One’s thought lay she— Till ripening years have run.

SUNDAY NIGHT, 27th January 1901.

WAR POEMS

EMBARCATION (Southampton Docks: October, 1899)

HERE, where Vespasian’s legions struck the sands, And Cerdic with his Saxons entered in, And Henry’s army leapt afloat to win Convincing triumphs over neighbour lands,

Vaster battalions press for further strands, To argue in the self-same bloody mode Which this late age of thought, and pact, and code, Still fails to mend.—Now deckward tramp the bands, Yellow as autumn leaves, alive as spring; And as each host draws out upon the sea Beyond which lies the tragical To-be, None dubious of the cause, none murmuring,

Wives, sisters, parents, wave white hands and smile, As if they knew not that they weep the while.

DEPARTURE (Southampton Docks: October, 1899)

WHILE the far farewell music thins and fails, And the broad bottoms rip the bearing brine— All smalling slowly to the gray sea line— And each significant red smoke-shaft pales,

Keen sense of severance everywhere prevails, Which shapes the late long tramp of mounting men To seeming words that ask and ask again: “How long, O striving Teutons, Slavs, and Gaels Must your wroth reasonings trade on lives like these, That are as puppets in a playing hand?— When shall the saner softer polities Whereof we dream, have play in each proud land, And patriotism, grown Godlike, scorn to stand Bondslave to realms, but circle earth and seas?”

THE COLONEL’S SOLILOQUY (Southampton Docks: October, 1899)

“THE quay recedes. Hurrah! Ahead we go! . . . It’s true I’ve been accustomed now to home, And joints get rusty, and one’s limbs may grow More fit to rest than roam.

“But I can stand as yet fair stress and strain; There’s not a little steel beneath the rust; My years mount somewhat, but here’s to’t again! And if I fall, I must.

Part 2

“God knows that for myself I’ve scanty care; Past scrimmages have proved as much to all; In Eastern lands and South I’ve had my share Both of the blade and ball.

“And where those villains ripped me in the flitch With their old iron in my early time, I’m apt at change of wind to feel a twitch, Or at a change of clime.

“And what my mirror shows me in the morning Has more of blotch and wrinkle than of bloom; My eyes, too, heretofore all glasses scorning, Have just a touch of rheum . . .

“Now sounds ‘The Girl I’ve left behind me,’—Ah, The years, the ardours, wakened by that tune! Time was when, with the crowd’s farewell ‘Hurrah!’ ’Twould lift me to the moon.

“But now it’s late to leave behind me one Who if, poor soul, her man goes underground, Will not recover as she might have done In days when hopes abound.

“She’s waving from the wharfside, palely grieving, As down we draw . . . Her tears make little show, Yet now she suffers more than at my leaving Some twenty years ago.

“I pray those left at home will care for her! I shall come back; I have before; though when The Girl you leave behind you is a grandmother, Things may not be as then.”

THE GOING OF THE BATTERY WIVES’ LAMENT (November 2, 1899)

O IT was sad enough, weak enough, mad enough— Light in their loving as soldiers can be— First to risk choosing them, leave alone losing them Now, in far battle, beyond the South Sea! . . .

—Rain came down drenchingly; but we unblenchingly Trudged on beside them through mirk and through mire, They stepping steadily—only too readily!— Scarce as if stepping brought parting-time nigher.

III

Great guns were gleaming there, living things seeming there, Cloaked in their tar-cloths, upmouthed to the night; Wheels wet and yellow from axle to felloe, Throats blank of sound, but prophetic to sight.

Gas-glimmers drearily, blearily, eerily Lit our pale faces outstretched for one kiss, While we stood prest to them, with a last quest to them Not to court perils that honour could miss.

Sharp were those sighs of ours, blinded these eyes of ours, When at last moved away under the arch All we loved. Aid for them each woman prayed for them, Treading back slowly the track of their march.

Someone said: “Nevermore will they come: evermore Are they now lost to us.” O it was wrong! Though may be hard their ways, some Hand will guard their ways, Bear them through safely, in brief time or long.

VII

—Yet, voices haunting us, daunting us, taunting us, Hint in the night-time when life beats are low Other and graver things . . . Hold we to braver things, Wait we, in trust, what Time’s fulness shall show.

AT THE WAR OFFICE, LONDON (Affixing the Lists of Killed and Wounded: December, 1899)

LAST year I called this world of gain-givings The darkest thinkable, and questioned sadly If my own land could heave its pulse less gladly, So charged it seemed with circumstance whence springs The tragedy of things.

Yet at that censured time no heart was rent Or feature blanched of parent, wife, or daughter By hourly blazoned sheets of listed slaughter; Death waited Nature’s wont; Peace smiled unshent From Ind to Occident.

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