“It never looks like summer here On Beeny by the sea.” But though she saw its look as drear, Summer it seemed to me. It never looks like summer now Whatever weather’s there; But ah, it cannot anyhow, On Beeny or elsewhere! BOSCASTLE, March 8, 1913.

Warm yellowy-green In the blue serene, How they skip and sway On this autumn day! They cannot know What has happened below, – That their boughs down there Are already quite bare, That their own will be When a week has passed, – For they jig as in glee To this very last. But no; […]

There was merry-making When the first dart fell As a heralding, – Till grinned the fully bared thing, And froze like a spell – Like a spell. Innocent was she, Innocent was I, Too simple we! Before us we did not see, Nearing, aught wry – Aught wry! I can tell it not now, It […]

“The house is bleak and cold Built so new for me! All the winds upon the wold Search it through for me; No screening trees abound, And the curious eyes around Keep on view for me.” “My Love, I am planting trees As a screen for you Both from winds, and eyes that tease And […]

There was a glorious time At an epoch of my prime; Mornings beryl-bespread, And evenings golden-red; Nothing gray: And in my heart I said, “However this chanced to be, It is too full for me, Too rare, too rapturous, rash, Its spell must close with a crash Some day!” The radiance went on Anon and […]

“The very last time I ever was here,” he said, “I saw much less of the quick than I saw of the dead.” – He was a man I had met with somewhere before, But how or when I now could recall no more. “The hazy mazy moonlight at one in the morning Spread out […]

No use hoping, or feeling vext, Tugged by a force above or under Like some fantocine, much I wonder What I shall find me doing next! Shall I be rushing where bright eyes be? Shall I be suffering sorrows seven? Shall I be watching the stars of heaven, Thinking one of them looks like thee? […]

I should not have shown in the flesh, I ought to have gone as a ghost; It was awkward, unseemly almost, Standing solidly there as when fresh, Pink, tiny, crisp-curled, My pinions yet furled From the winds of the world. After waiting so many a year To wait longer, and go as a sprite From […]

I thought, my Heart, that you had healed Of those sore smartings of the past, And that the summers had oversealed All mark of them at last. But closely scanning in the night I saw them standing crimson-bright Just as she made them: Nothing could fade them; Yea, I can swear That there they were […]

At last I entered a long dark gallery, Catacomb-lined; and ranged at the side Were the bodies of men from far and wide Who, motion past, were nevertheless not dead. “The sense of waiting here strikes strong; Everyone’s waiting, waiting, it seems to me; What are you waiting for so long? – What is to […]

At the shiver of morning, a little before the false dawn, The moon was at the window-square, Deedily brooding in deformed decay – The curve hewn off her cheek as by an adze; At the shiver of morning a little before the false dawn So the moon looked in there. Her speechless eyeing reached across […]

In the third-class seat sat the journeying boy, And the roof-lamp’s oily flame Played down on his listless form and face, Bewrapt past knowing to what he was going, Or whence he came. In the band of his hat the journeying boy Had a ticket stuck; and a string Around his neck bore the key […]

(She, alone) I rose and went to Rou’tor Town With gaiety and good heart, And ardour for the start, That morning ere the moon was down That lit me off to Rou’tor Town With gaiety and good heart. When sojourn soon at Rou’tor Town Wrote sorrows on my face, I strove that none should trace […]

This, then, is the grave of my son, Whose heart she won! And nettles grow Upon his mound; and she lives just below. How he upbraided me, and left, And our lives were cleft, because I said She was hard, unfeeling, caring but to wed. Well, to see this sight I have fared these miles, […]

On a morning sick as the day of doom With the drizzling gray Of an English May, There were few in the railway waiting-room. About its walls were framed and varnished Pictures of liners, fly-blown, tarnished. The table bore a Testament For travellers’ reading, if suchwise bent. I read it on and on, And, thronging […]

It is dark as a cave, Or a vault in the nave When the iron door Is closed, and the floor Of the church relaid With trowel and spade. But the parish-clerk Cares not for the dark As he winds in the tower At a regular hour The rheumatic clock, Whose dilatory knock You can […]

I found me in a great surging space, At either end a door, And I said: “What is this giddying place, With no firm-fixed floor, That I knew not of before?” “It is Life,” said a mask-clad face. I asked: “But how do I come here, Who never wished to come; Can the light and […]

“What’s the good of going to Ridgeway, Cerne, or Sydling Mill, Or to Yell’ham Hill, Blithely bearing Casterbridge-way As we used to do? She will no more climb up there, Or be visible anywhere In those haunts we knew.” But to-night, while walking weary, Near me seemed her shade, Come as ’twere to upbraid This […]

That whisper takes the voice Of a Spirit’s compassionings Close, but invisible, And throws me under a spell At the kindling vision it brings; And for a moment I rejoice, And believe in transcendent things That would mould from this muddy earth A spot for the splendid birth Of everlasting lives, Whereto no night arrives; […]

It was when Whirls of thick waters laved me Again and again, That something arose and saved me; Yea, it was then. In that day Unseeing the azure went I On my way, And to white winter bent I, Knowing no May. Reft of renown, Under the night clouds beating Up and down, In my […]