Between us now and here – Two thrown together Who are not wont to wear Life’s flushest feather – Who see the scenes slide past, The daytimes dimming fast, Let there be truth at last, Even if despair. So thoroughly and long Have you now known me, So real in faith and strong Have I […]

You did not come, And marching Time drew on, and wore me numb. – Yet less for loss of your dear presence there Than that I thus found lacking in your make That high compassion which can overbear Reluctance for pure lovingkindness’ sake Grieved I, when, as the hope-hour stroked its sum, You did not […]

I need not go Through sleet and snow To where I know She waits for me; She will wait me there Till I find it fair, And have time to spare From company. When I’ve overgot The world somewhat, When things cost not Such stress and strain, Is soon enough By cypress sough To tell […]

(TRIOLET) How great my grief, my joys how few, Since first it was my fate to know thee! – Have the slow years not brought to view How great my grief, my joys how few, Nor memory shaped old times anew, Nor loving-kindness helped to show thee How great my grief, my joys how few, […]

In years defaced and lost, Two sat here, transport-tossed, Lit by a living love The wilted world knew nothing of: Scared momently By gaingivings, Then hoping things That could not be. Of love and us no trace Abides upon the place; The sun and shadows wheel, Season and season sereward steal; Foul days and fair […]

(TRIOLETS) I For long the cruel wish I knew That your free heart should ache for me While mine should bear no ache for you; For, long–the cruel wish!–I knew How men can feel, and craved to view My triumph–fated not to be For long! . . . The cruel wish I knew That your […]

Is it worth while, dear, now, To call for bells, and sally forth arrayed For marriage-rites — discussed, decried, delayed So many years? Is it worth while, dear, now, To stir desire for old fond purposings, By feints that Time still serves for dallyings, Though quittance nears? Is it worth while, dear, when The day […]

(TRIOLET) If hours be years the twain are blest, For now they solace swift desire By bonds of every bond the best, If hours be years. The twain are blest Do eastern stars slope never west, Nor pallid ashes follow fire: If hours be years the twain are blest, For now they solace swift desire.

By Mellstock Lodge and Avenue Towards her door I went, And sunset on her window-panes Reflected our intent. The creeper on the gable nigh Was fired to more than red And when I came to halt thereby “Bright as my joy!” I said. Of late days it had been her aim To meet me in […]

I I saw a dead man’s finer part Shining within each faithful heart Of those bereft. Then said I: “This must be His immortality.” II I looked there as the seasons wore, And still his soul continuously upbore Its life in theirs. But less its shine excelled Than when I first beheld. III His fellow-yearsmen […]

A dream of mine flew over the mead To the halls where my old Love reigns; And it drew me on to follow its lead: And I stood at her window-panes; And I saw but a thing of flesh and bone Speeding on to its cleft in the clay; And my dream was scared, and […]

I I heard a small sad sound, And stood awhile amid the tombs around: “Wherefore, old friends,” said I, “are ye distrest, Now, screened from life’s unrest?” II –“O not at being here; But that our future second death is drear; When, with the living, memory of us numbs, And blank oblivion comes! III “Those […]

I Never a careworn wife but shows, If a joy suffuse her, Something beautiful to those Patient to peruse her, Some one charm the world unknows Precious to a muser, Haply what, ere years were foes, Moved her mate to choose her. II But, be it a hint of rose That an instant hues her, […]

I As newer comers crowd the fore, We drop behind. – We who have laboured long and sore Times out of mind, And keen are yet, must not regret To drop behind. II Yet there are of us some who grieve To go behind; Staunch, strenuous souls who scarce believe Their fires declined, And know […]

I A shaded lamp and a waving blind, And the beat of a clock from a distant floor: On this scene enter–winged, horned, and spined – A longlegs, a moth, and a dumbledore; While ‘mid my page there idly stands A sleepy fly, that rubs its hands . . . II Thus meet we five, […]

(TRIOLET) Around the house the flakes fly faster, And all the berries now are gone From holly and cotoneaster Around the house. The flakes fly!–faster Shutting indoors that crumb-outcaster We used to see upon the lawn Around the house. The flakes fly faster, And all the berries now are gone! MAX GATE.

(VILLANELLE) “Men know but little more than we, Who count us least of things terrene, How happy days are made to be! “Of such strange tidings what think ye, O birds in brown that peck and preen? Men know but little more than we! “When I was borne from yonder tree In bonds to them, […]

SCENE.–A wide stretch of fallow ground recently sown with wheat, and frozen to iron hardness. Three large birds walking about thereon, and wistfully eyeing the surface. Wind keen from north-east: sky a dull grey. (TRIOLET) Rook.–Throughout the field I find no grain; The cruel frost encrusts the cornland! Starling.–Aye: patient pecking now is vain Throughout […]

(TRIOLET) They are not those who used to feed us When we were young–they cannot be – These shapes that now bereave and bleed us? They are not those who used to feed us, – For would they not fair terms concede us? – If hearts can house such treachery They are not those who […]

Why should this flower delay so long To show its tremulous plumes? Now is the time of plaintive robin-song, When flowers are in their tombs. Through the slow summer, when the sun Called to each frond and whorl That all he could for flowers was being done, Why did it not uncurl? It must have […]