Wessex Poems and Other Verses
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HER IMMORTALITY
Upon a noon I pilgrimed throughA pasture, mile by mile,Unto the place where I last sawMy dead Love’s living smile.And sorrowing I lay me downUpon the heated sod:It seemed as if my body pressedThe very ground she trod.I lay, and thought; and in a tranceShe came and stood me by —The same, even to the marvellous rayThat used to light her eye.“You draw me, and I come to you,My faithful one,” she said,In voice that had the moving toneIt bore ere breath had fled.She said: “’Tis seven years since I died:Few now remember me;My husband clasps another bride;My children’s love has she.“My brethren, sisters, and my friendsCare not to meet my sprite:Who prized me most I did not knowTill I passed down from sight.”I said: “My days are lonely here;I need thy smile alway:I’ll use this night my ball or blade,And join thee ere the day.”A tremor stirred her tender lips,Which parted to dissuade:“That cannot be, O friend,” she cried;“Think, I am but a Shade!“A Shade but in its mindful onesHas immortality;By living, me you keep alive,By dying you slay me.“In you resides my single powerOf sweet continuance here;On your fidelity I countThrough many a coming year.”– I started through me at her plight,So suddenly confessed:Dismissing late distaste for life,I craved its bleak unrest.“I will not die, my One of all! —To lengthen out thy daysI’ll guard me from minutest harmsThat may invest my ways!”She smiled and went. Since then she comesOft when her birth-moon climbs,Or at the seasons’ ingressesOr anniversary times;But grows my grief. When I surcease,Through whom alone lives she,Ceases my Love, her words, her ways,Never again to be!THE IVY-WIFE
I longed to love a full-boughed beechAnd be as high as he:I stretched an arm within his reach,And signalled unity.But with his drip he forced a breach,And tried to poison me.I gave the grasp of partnershipTo one of other race —A plane: he barked him strip by stripFrom upper bough to base;And me therewith; for gone my grip,My arms could not enlace.In new affection next I stroveTo coll an ash I saw,And he in trust received my love;Till with my soft green clawI cramped and bound him as I wove..Such was my love: ha-ha!By this I gained his strength and heightWithout his rivalry.But in my triumph I lost sightOf afterhaps. Soon he,Being bark-bound, flagged, snapped, fell outright,And in his fall felled me!A MEETING WITH DESPAIR
As evening shaped I found me on a moorWhich sight could scarce sustain:The black lean land, of featureless contour,Was like a tract in pain.“This scene, like my own life,” I said, “is oneWhere many glooms abide;Toned by its fortune to a deadly dun —Lightless on every side.I glanced aloft and halted, pleasure-caughtTo see the contrast there:The ray-lit clouds gleamed glory; and I thought,“There’s solace everywhere!”Then bitter self-reproaches as I stoodI dealt me silentlyAs one perverse – misrepresenting GoodIn graceless mutiny.Against the horizon’s dim-discernèd wheelA form rose, strange of mould:That he was hideous, hopeless, I could feelRather than could behold.“’Tis a dead spot, where even the light lies spentTo darkness!” croaked the Thing.“Not if you look aloft!” said I, intentOn my new reasoning.“Yea – but await awhile!” he cried. “Ho-ho! —Look now aloft and see!”I looked. There, too, sat night: Heaven’s radiant showHad gone. Then chuckled he.UNKNOWING
When, soul in soul reflected,We breathed an æthered air,When we neglectedAll things elsewhere,And left the friendly friendlessTo keep our love aglow,We deemed it endless..– We did not know!When, by mad passion goaded,We planned to hie away,But, unforeboded,The storm-shafts graySo heavily down-patteredThat none could forthward go,Our lives seemed shattered..– We did not know!When I found you, helpless lying,And you waived my deep misprise,And swore me, dying,In phantom-guiseTo wing to me when grieving,And touch away my woe,We kissed, believing..– We did not know!But though, your powers outreckoning,You hold you dead and dumb,Or scorn my beckoning,And will not come;And I say, “’Twere mood ungainlyTo store her memory so:”I say it vainly —I feel and know!FRIENDS BEYOND
William Dewy, Tranter Reuben, Farmer Ledlow late at plough,Robert’s kin, and John’s, and Ned’s,And the Squire, and Lady Susan, lie in Mellstock churchyard now!“Gone,” I call them, gone for good, that group of local hearts and heads;Yet at mothy curfew-tide,And at midnight when the noon-heat breathes it back from walls and leads,They’ve a way of whispering to me – fellow-wight who yet abide —In the muted, measured noteOf a ripple under archways, or a lone cave’s stillicide:“We have triumphed: this achievement turns the bane to antidote,Unsuccesses to success,– Many thought-worn eves and morrows to a morrow free of thought.“No more need we corn and clothing, feel of old terrestrial stress;Chill detraction stirs no sigh;Fear of death has even bygone us: death gave all that we possess.”W. D.– “Ye mid burn the wold bass-viol that I set such vallie by.”Squire. – “You may hold the manse in fee,You may wed my spouse, my children’s memory of me may decry.”Lady. – “You may have my rich brocades, my laces; take each household key;Ransack coffer, desk, bureau;Quiz the few poor treasures hid there, con the letters kept by me.”Far.– “Ye mid zell my favourite heifer, ye mid let the charlock grow,Foul the grinterns, give up thrift.”Wife. – “If ye break my best blue china, children, I shan’t care or ho.”All. – “We’ve no wish to hear the tidings, how the people’s fortunes shift;What your daily doings are;Who are wedded, born, divided; if your lives beat slow or swift.“Curious not the least are we if our intents you make or mar,If you quire to our old tune,If the City stage still passes, if the weirs still roar afar.”– Thus, with very gods’ composure, freed those crosses late and soonWhich, in life, the Trine allow(Why, none witteth), and ignoring all that haps beneath the moon,William Dewy, Tranter Reuben, Farmer Ledlow late at plough,Robert’s kin, and John’s, and Ned’s,And the Squire, and Lady Susan, murmur mildly to me now.TO OUTER NATURE
Show thee as I thought theeWhen I early sought thee,Omen-scouting,All undoubtingLove alone had wrought thee —Wrought thee for my pleasure,Planned thee as a measureFor expoundingAnd resoundingGlad things that men treasure.O for but a momentOf that old endowment —Light to gailySee thy dailyIrisèd embowment!But such re-adorningTime forbids with scorning —Makes me see thingsCease to be thingsThey were in my morning.Fad’st thou, glow-forsaken,Darkness-overtaken!Thy first sweetness,Radiance, meetness,None shall re-awaken.Why not sempiternalThou and I? Our vernalBrightness keeping,Time outleaping;Passed the hodiernal!THOUGHTS OF PHENA
AT NEWS OF HER DEATH
Not a line of her writing have I,Not a thread of her hair,No mark of her late time as dame in her dwelling, wherebyI may picture her there;And in vain do I urge my unsightTo conceive my lost prizeAt her close, whom I knew when her dreams were upbrimming with light,And with laughter her eyes.What scenes spread around her last days,Sad, shining, or dim?Did her gifts and compassions enray and enarch her sweet waysWith an aureate nimb?Or did life-light decline from her years,And mischances controlHer full day-star; unease, or regret, or forebodings, or fearsDisennoble her soul?Thus I do but the phantom retainOf the maiden of yoreAs my relic; yet haply the best of her – fined in my brainIt maybe the moreThat no line of her writing have I,Nor a thread of her hair,No mark of her late time as dame in her dwelling, wherebyI may picture her there. March 1890.MIDDLE-AGE ENTHUSIASMS
To M. H
We passed where flag and flowerSignalled a jocund throng;We said: “Go to, the hourIs apt!” – and joined the song;And, kindling, laughed at life and care,Although we knew no laugh lay there.We walked where shy birds stoodWatching us, wonder-dumb;Their friendship met our mood;We cried: “We’ll often come:We’ll come morn, noon, eve, everywhen!”– We doubted we should come again.We joyed to see strange sheensLeap from quaint leaves in shade;A secret light of greensThey’d for their pleasure made.We said: “We’ll set such sorts as these!”– We knew with night the wish would cease.“So sweet the place,” we said,“Its tacit tales so dear,Our thoughts, when breath has sped,Will meet and mingle here!”.“Words!” mused we. “Passed the mortal door,Our thoughts will reach this nook no more.”IN A WOOD
See “THE WOODLANDERS”
Pale beech and pine-tree blue,Set in one clay,Bough to bough cannot youBide out your day?When the rains skim and skip,Why mar sweet comradeship,Blighting with poison-dripNeighbourly spray?Heart-halt and spirit-lame,City-opprest,Unto this wood I cameAs to a nest;Dreaming that sylvan peaceOffered the harrowed ease —Nature a soft releaseFrom men’s unrest.But, having entered in,Great growths and smallShow them to men akin —Combatants all!Sycamore shoulders oak,Bines the slim sapling yoke,Ivy-spun halters chokeElms stout and tall.Touches from ash, O wych,Sting you like scorn!You, too, brave hollies, twitchSidelong from thornEven the rank poplars bearIlly a rival’s air,Cankering in black despairIf overborne.Since, then, no grace I findTaught me of trees,Turn I back to my kind,Worthy as these.There at least smiles abound,There discourse trills around,There, now and then, are foundLife-loyalties.1887: 1896.TO A LADY
OFFENDED BY A BOOK OF THE WRITER’S
Now that my page upcloses, doomed, maybe,Never to press thy cosy cushions more,Or wake thy ready Yeas as heretofore,Or stir thy gentle vows of faith in me:Knowing thy natural receptivityI figure that, as flambeaux banish eve,My sombre image, warped by insidious heaveOf those less forthright, must lose place in thee.So be it. I have borne such. Let thy dreamsOf me and mine diminish day by day,And yield their space to shine of smugger things;Till I shape to thee but in fitful gleams,And then in far and feeble visitings,And then surcease. Truth will be truth alway.TO AN ORPHAN CHILD
A WHIMSEY
Ah, child, thou art but half thy darling mother’s;Hers couldst thou wholly be,My light in thee would outglow all in others;She would relive to me.But niggard Nature’s trick of birthBars, lest she overjoy,Renewal of the loved on earthSave with alloy.The Dame has no regard, alas, my maiden,For love and loss like mine —No sympathy with mind-sight memory-laden;Only with fickle eyne.To her mechanic artistryMy dreams are all unknown,And why I wish that thou couldst beBut One’s alone!NATURE’S QUESTIONING
When I look forth at dawning, pool,Field, flock, and lonely tree,All seem to gaze at meLike chastened children sitting silent in a school; Their faces dulled, constrained, and worn,As though the master’s waysThrough the long teaching daysTheir first terrestrial zest had chilled and overborne. And on them stirs, in lippings mere(As if once clear in call,But now scarce breathed at all) —“We wonder, ever wonder, why we find us here! “Has some Vast Imbecility,Mighty to build and blend,But impotent to tend,Framed us in jest, and left us now to hazardry? “Or come we of an AutomatonUnconscious of our pains?..Or are we live remainsOf Godhead dying downwards, brain and eye now gone? “Or is it that some high Plan betides,As yet not understood,Of Evil stormed by Good,We the Forlorn Hope over which Achievement strides?” Thus things around. No answerer I..Meanwhile the winds, and rains,And Earth’s old glooms and painsAre still the same, and gladdest Life Death neighbours nigh.THE IMPERCIPIENT
(AT A CATHEDRAL SERVICE)
That from this bright believing bandAn outcast I should be,That faiths by which my comrades standSeem fantasies to me,And mirage-mists their Shining Land,Is a drear destiny.Why thus my soul should be consignedTo infelicity,Why always I must feel as blindTo sights my brethren see,Why joys they’ve found I cannot find,Abides a mystery.Since heart of mine knows not that easeWhich they know; since it beThat He who breathes All’s Well to theseBreathes no All’s-Well to me,My lack might move their sympathiesAnd Christian charity!I am like a gazer who should markAn inland companyStanding upfingered, with, “Hark! hark!The glorious distant sea!”And feel, “Alas, ’tis but yon darkAnd wind-swept pine to me!”Yet I would bear my shortcomingsWith meet tranquillity,But for the charge that blessed thingsI’d liefer have unbe.O, doth a bird deprived of wingsGo earth-bound wilfully!* * * * *Enough. As yet disquiet clingsAbout us. Rest shall we.AT AN INN
When we as strangers soughtTheir catering care,Veiled smiles bespoke their thoughtOf what we were.They warmed as they opinedUs more than friends —That we had all resignedFor love’s dear ends.And that swift sympathyWith living loveWhich quicks the world – maybeThe spheres above,Made them our ministers,Moved them to say,“Ah, God, that bliss like theirsWould flush our day!”And we were left aloneAs Love’s own pair;Yet never the love-light shoneBetween us there!But that which chilled the breathOf afternoon,And palsied unto deathThe pane-fly’s tune.The kiss their zeal foretold,And now deemed come,Came not: within his holdLove lingered-numb.Why cast he on our portA bloom not ours?Why shaped us for his sportIn after-hours?As we seemed we were notThat day afar,And now we seem not whatWe aching are.O severing sea and land,O laws of men,Ere death, once let us standAs we stood then!THE SLOW NATURE
(AN INCIDENT OF FROOM VALLEY)
“Thy husband – poor, poor Heart! – is dead —Dead, out by Moreford Rise;A bull escaped the barton-shed,Gored him, and there he lies!”– “Ha, ha – go away! ’Tis a tale, methink,Thou joker Kit!” laughed she.“I’ve known thee many a year, Kit Twink,And ever hast thou fooled me!”– “But, Mistress Damon – I can swearThy goodman John is dead!And soon th’lt hear their feet who bearHis body to his bed.”So unwontedly sad was the merry man’s face —That face which had long deceived —That she gazed and gazed; and then could traceThe truth there; and she believed.She laid a hand on the dresser-ledge,And scanned far Egdon-side;And stood; and you heard the wind-swept sedgeAnd the rippling Froom; till she cried:“O my chamber’s untidied, unmade my bedThough the day has begun to wear!‘What a slovenly hussif!’ it will be said,When they all go up my stair!”She disappeared; and the joker stoodDepressed by his neighbour’s doom,And amazed that a wife struck to widowhoodThought first of her unkempt room.But a fortnight thence she could take no food,And she pined in a slow decay;While Kit soon lost his mournful moodAnd laughed in his ancient way.1894.IN A EWELEAZE NEAR WEATHERBURY
The years have gathered graylySince I danced upon this leazeWith one who kindled gailyLove’s fitful ecstasies!But despite the term as teacher,I remain what I was thenIn each essential featureOf the fantasies of men.Yet I note the little chiselOf never-napping Time,Defacing ghast and grizzelThe blazon of my prime.When at night he thinks me sleeping,I feel him boring slyWithin my bones, and heapingQuaintest pains for by-and-by.Still, I’d go the world with Beauty,I would laugh with her and sing,I would shun divinest dutyTo resume her worshipping.But she’d scorn my brave endeavour,She would not balm the breezeBy murmuring “Thine for ever!”As she did upon this leaze.1890.ADDITIONS
THE FIRE AT TRANTER SWEATLEY’S
They had long met o’ Zundays – her true love and she —And at junketings, maypoles, and flings;But she bode wi’ a thirtover uncle, and heSwore by noon and by night that her goodman should beNaibour Sweatley – a gaffer oft weak at the kneeFrom taking o’ sommat more cheerful than tea —Who tranted, and moved people’s things.She cried, “O pray pity me!” Nought would he hear;Then with wild rainy eyes she obeyed.She chid when her Love was for clinking off wi’ her.The pa’son was told, as the season drew nearTo throw over pu’pit the names of the peäirAs fitting one flesh to be made.The wedding-day dawned and the morning drew on;The couple stood bridegroom and bride;The evening was passed, and when midnight had goneThe folks horned out, “God save the King,” and anonThe two home-along gloomily hied.The lover Tim Tankens mourned heart-sick and drearTo be thus of his darling deprived:He roamed in the dark ath’art field, mound, and mere,And, a’most without knowing it, found himself nearThe house of the tranter, and now of his Dear,Where the lantern-light showed ’em arrived.The bride sought her cham’er so calm and so paleThat a Northern had thought her resigned;But to eyes that had seen her in tide-times of weal,Like the white cloud o’ smoke, the red battle-field’s vail,That look spak’ of havoc behind.The bridegroom yet laitered a beaker to drain,Then reeled to the linhay for more,When the candle-snoff kindled some chaff from his grain —Flames spread, and red vlankers, wi’ might and wi’ main,And round beams, thatch, and chimley-tun roar.Young Tim away yond, rafted up by the light,Through brimble and underwood tears,Till he comes to the orchet, when crooping thererightIn the lewth of a codlin-tree, bivering wi’ fright,Wi’ on’y her night-rail to screen her from sight,His lonesome young Barbree appears.Her cwold little figure half-naked he views Played about by the frolicsome breeze,Her light-tripping totties, her ten little tooes,All bare and besprinkled wi’ Fall’s chilly dews,While her great gallied eyes, through her hair hanging loose,Sheened as stars through a tardle o’ trees.She eyed en; and, as when a weir-hatch is drawn,Her tears, penned by terror afore,With a rushing of sobs in a shower were strawn,Till her power to pour ’em seemed wasted and goneFrom the heft o’ misfortune she bore.“O Tim, my own Tim I must call ’ee – I will!All the world ha’ turned round on me so!Can you help her who loved ’ee, though acting so ill?Can you pity her misery – feel for her still?When worse than her body so quivering and chillIs her heart in its winter o’ woe!“I think I mid almost ha’ borne it,” she said,“Had my griefs one by one come to hand;But O, to be slave to thik husbird for bread,And then, upon top o’ that, driven to wed,And then, upon top o’ that, burnt out o’ bed,Is more than my nater can stand!”Tim’s soul like a lion ’ithin en outsprung —(Tim had a great soul when his feelings were wrung) —“Feel for ’ee, dear Barbree?” he cried;And his warm working-jacket about her he flung,Made a back, horsed her up, till behind him she clungLike a chiel on a gipsy, her figure uphungBy the sleeves that around her he tied.Over piggeries, and mixens, and apples, and hay,They lumpered straight into the night;And finding bylong where a halter-path lay,At dawn reached Tim’s house, on’y seen on their wayBy a naibour or two who were up wi’ the day;But they gathered no clue to the sight.Then tender Tim Tankens he searched here and thereFor some garment to clothe her fair skin;But though he had breeches and waistcoats to spare,He had nothing quite seemly for Barbree to wear,Who, half shrammed to death, stood and cried on a chairAt the caddle she found herself in.There was one thing to do, and that one thing he did,He lent her some clouts of his own,And she took ’em perforce; and while in ’em she slid,Tim turned to the winder, as modesty bid,Thinking, “O that the picter my duty keeps hidTo the sight o’ my eyes mid be shown!”In the tallet he stowed her; there huddied she lay,Shortening sleeves, legs, and tails to her limbs;But most o’ the time in a mortal bad way,Well knowing that there’d be the divel to payIf ’twere found that, instead o’ the elements’ prey,She was living in lodgings at Tim’s.“Where’s the tranter?” said men and boys; “where can er be?”“Where’s the tranter?” said Barbree alone.“Where on e’th is the tranter?” said everybod-y:They sifted the dust of his perished roof-tree,And all they could find was a bone.Then the uncle cried, “Lord, pray have mercy on me!”And in terror began to repent.But before ’twas complete, and till sure she was free,Barbree drew up her loft-ladder, tight turned her key —Tim bringing up breakfast and dinner and tea —Till the news of her hiding got vent.Then followed the custom-kept rout, shout, and flareOf a skimmington-ride through the naibourhood, ereFolk had proof o’ wold Sweatley’s decay.Whereupon decent people all stood in a stare,Saying Tim and his lodger should risk it, and pair:So he took her to church. An’ some laughing lads thereCried to Tim, “After Sweatley!” She said, “I declareI stand as a maiden to-day!” Written 1866; printed 1875.HEIRESS AND ARCHITECTFor A. W. B
She sought the Studios, beckoning to her sideAn arch-designer, for she planned to build.He was of wise contrivance, deeply skilledIn every intervolve of high and wide – Well fit to be her guide.“Whatever it be,”Responded he,With cold, clear voice, and cold, clear view,“In true accord with prudent fashioningsFor such vicissitudes as living brings,And thwarting not the law of stable things,That will I do.”“Shape me,” she said, “high halls with traceryAnd open ogive-work, that scent and hueOf buds, and travelling bees, may come in through,The note of birds, and singings of the sea,For these are much to me.”“An idle whim!” Broke forth from himWhom nought could warm to gallantries:“Cede all these buds and birds, the zephyr’s call,And scents, and hues, and things that falter all,And choose as best the close and surly wall,For winters freeze.”“Then frame,” she cried, “wide fronts of crystal glass,That I may show my laughter and my light —Light like the sun’s by day, the stars’ by night —Till rival heart-queens, envying, wail, ‘Alas,Her glory!’ as they pass.”“O maid misled!”He sternly said,Whose facile foresight pierced her dire;“Where shall abide the soul when, sick of glee,It shrinks, and hides, and prays no eye may see?Those house them best who house for secrecy,For you will tire.”“A little chamber, then, with swan and doveRanged thickly, and engrailed with rare deviceOf reds and purples, for a ParadiseWherein my Love may greet me, I my Love,When he shall know thereof?”“This, too, is ill,”He answered still,The man who swayed her like a shade.“An hour will come when sight of such sweet nookWould bring a bitterness too sharp to brook,When brighter eyes have won away his look;For you will fade.”Then said she faintly: “O, contrive some way —Some narrow winding turret, quite mine own,To reach a loft where I may grieve alone!It is a slight thing; hence do not, I pray,This last dear fancy slay!”“Such winding waysFit not your days,”Said he, the man of measuring eye;“I must even fashion as my rule declares,To wit: Give space (since life ends unawares)To hale a coffined corpse adown the stairs;For you will die.”1867.THE TWO MEN
There were two youths of equal age,Wit, station, strength, and parentage;They studied at the selfsame schools,And shaped their thoughts by common rules.One pondered on the life of man,His hopes, his ending, and beganTo rate the Market’s sordid warAs something scarce worth living for.“I’ll brace to higher aims,” said he,“I’ll further Truth and Purity;Thereby to mend the mortal lotAnd sweeten sorrow. Thrive I not,“Winning their hearts, my kind will giveEnough that I may lowly live,And house my Love in some dim dell,For pleasing them and theirs so well.”Idly attired, with features wan,In secret swift he laboured on:Such press of power had brought much goldApplied to things of meaner mould.Sometimes he wished his aims had beenTo gather gains like other men;Then thanked his God he’d traced his trackToo far for wish to drag him back.He lookèd from his loft one dayTo where his slighted garden lay;Nettles and hemlock hid each lawn,And every flower was starved and gone.He fainted in his heart, whereonHe rose, and sought his plighted one,Resolved to loose her bond withal,Lest she should perish in his fall.He met her with a careless air,As though he’d ceased to find her fair,And said: “True love is dust to me;I cannot kiss: I tire of thee!”(That she might scorn him was he fain,To put her sooner out of pain;For incensed love breathes quick and dies,When famished love a-lingering lies.)Once done, his soul was so betossed,It found no more the force it lost:Hope was his only drink and food,And hope extinct, decay ensued.And, living long so closely penned,He had not kept a single friend;He dwindled thin as phantoms be,And drooped to death in poverty.Meantime his schoolmate had gone outTo join the fortune-finding rout;He liked the winnings of the mart,But wearied of the working part.He turned to seek a privy lair,Neglecting note of garb and hair,And day by day reclined and thoughtHow he might live by doing nought.“I plan a valued scheme,” he saidTo some. “But lend me of your bread,And when the vast result looms nigh,In profit you shall stand as I.”Yet they took counsel to restrainTheir kindness till they saw the gain;And, since his substance now had run,He rose to do what might be done.He went unto his Love by night,And said: “My Love, I faint in fight:Deserving as thou dost a crown,My cares shall never drag thee down.”(He had descried a maid whose lineWould hand her on much corn and wine,And held her far in worth aboveOne who could only pray and love.)But this Fair read him; whence he failedTo do the deed so blithely hailed;He saw his projects wholly marred,And gloom and want oppressed him hard;Till, living to so mean an end,Whereby he’d lost his every friend,He perished in a pauper sty,His mate the dying pauper nigh.And moralists, reflecting, said,As “dust to dust” in burial readWas echoed from each coffin-lid,“These men were like in all they did.”1866.