Thomas Hardy is remembered today for novels such as Jude the Obscure and Tess of the d’Urbervilles. But, there is a wealth of content to explore in his masterful poetry. Read more about Thomas Hardy.
‘How Great My Grief’ by Thomas Hardy is a moving poem that examines a different kind of grief than the poet is typically associated with expressing.
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,
‘To Life’ by Thomas Hardy is a deeply poignant poem that personifies life as a dreary individual whom the speaker accosts out of sadness.
O Life with the sad seared face,
I weary of seeing thee,
And thy draggled cloak, and thy hobbling pace,
And thy too-forced pleasantry!
‘Beeny Cliff’ by Thomas Hardy examines the disenchantment of a location that was once fondly beloved for its setting as a happy memory.
O the opal and the sapphire of that wandering western sea,
And the woman riding high above with bright hair flapping free–
The woman whom I loved so, and who loyally loved me.
‘Her Initials’ by Thomas Hardy is a deeply poignant poem that wrestles lucidly with grief’s diminishing effect on memories of loved ones.
Upon a poet’s page I wrote
Of old two letters of her name;
Part seemed she of the effulgent thought
Whence that high singer’s rapture came.
‘Heredity’ by Thomas Hardy is a persona poem personalizing the titular speaker who brags about its ability to outlive individual human lives.
I am the family face;
Flesh perishes, I live on,
Projecting trait and trace
Through time to times anon,
‘A Thunderstorm In Town’ by Thomas Hardy presents two contrasting scenes: the dry interior of a carriage and the havoc of a thunderstorm outside. But the powerful imagery and symbolism mainly illustrate a memory of lovelorn regret by the speaker.
She wore a 'terra-cotta' dress,
And we stayed, because of the pelting storm,
Within the hansom's dry recess,
Though the horse had stopped; yea, motionless
Thomas Hardy’s ‘In a Wood’ explores disillusionment in nature as conflicts and rivalries undermine the speaker’s search for solace.
Pale beech and pine-tree blue,
Set in one clay,
Bough to bough cannot you
Bide out your day?
Hardy’s poetry focuses on themes such as disappointment, thwarted love, and pessimism. ‘A Broken Appointment’ provokes empathy towards the lyrical voice.
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
‘A Sheep Fair’ is a solemn look at one day of country life, at the autumn fair, as sheep, the auctioneer, and the buyers contend with torrential rain.
The day arrives of the autumn fair,
And torrents fall,
Though sheep in throngs are gathered there,
Ten thousand all,
I bore a daughter flower-fair,
In Pydel Vale, alas for me;
I joyed to mother one so rare,
But dead and gone I now would be.
From Wynyard's Gap the livelong day,
The livelong day,
We beat afoot the northward way
We had travelled times before.
She sits in the tawny vapour
That the Thames-side lanes have uprolled,
Behind whose webby fold-on-fold
Like a waning taper
I come to interview a Voiceless ghost;
Whither, O whither will its whim now draw me?
Up the cliff, down, till I'm lonely, lost,
And the unseen waters' soliloquies awe me.
When the Present has latched its postern behind my tremulous stay,
And the May month flaps its glad green leaves like wings,
Delicate-filmed as new-spun silk, will the neighbours say,
"He was a man who used to notice such things"?
‘An August Midnight’ was written in 1899 by ‘Thomas Hardy’, published in 1901. The main theme in this poem is the meaning and purpose in life.
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;
‘And There Was a Great Calm’ by Thomas Hardy describes the horrors of WWI, the end of the war, and the ‘Great Calm’ which came on November 11th, 1918.
There had been years of Passion—scorching, cold,
And much Despair, and Anger heaving high,
Care whitely watching, Sorrows manifold,
Among the young, among the weak and old,
‘At an Inn’ by Thomas Hardy recalls a stay that Hardy and his close female friend had at an inn. At the time they were not in love, but seemed to be.
And we were left alone
As Love's own pair;
Yet never the love-light shone
Between us there!
‘At Castle Boterel’ was written in 1913. The poem remembers a certain moment in life that is associated with a deeply significant memory.
As I drive to the junction of lane and highway,
And the drizzle bedrenches the waggonette,
I look behind at the fading byway,
And see on its slope, now glistening wet,
That night your great guns, unawares,
Shook all our coffins as we lay,
And broke the chancel window-squares,
We thought it was the Judgment-day
They throw in Drummer Hodge, to rest
Uncoffined—just as found:
His landmark is a kopje-crest
That breaks the veldt around;
Well, World, you have kept faith with me,
Kept faith with me;
Upon the whole you have proved to be
Much as you said you were.
‘I look into my glass’ by Thomas Hardy describes the painful process of aging and how one’s mental age is not always in line with one’s physical.
I look into my glass,
And view my wasting skin,
And say, "Would God it came to pass
My heart had shrunk as thin!"
‘I Looked Up from My Writing’ by Thomas Hardy is a existentially contemplative piece in which a writer is confronted with his own ignorance and irresponsibility.
I looked up from my writing,
And gave a start to see,
As if rapt in my inditing,
The moon's full gaze on me.
Thomas Hardy’s ‘I Said To Love’ is about love and the difficulties that love creates on people. This poem reveals a speaker’s agonized reaction to love.
I said to Love,
"It is not now as in old days
When men adored thee and thy ways
All else above;
‘In Tenebris: I’ by Thomas Hardy is one of three poems devoted to an exploration of the poet’s own grief. He was mourning the decline of his marriage and writing career.
Wintertime nighs;
But my bereavement-pain
It cannot bring again:
Twice no one dies.
‘In the Servants’ Quarters’ by Thomas Hardy speaks into a biblical story and gives the reader insight as to what Peter may have been feeling, and the pressure he was under at the time when he denied knowing Jesus.
'Man, you too, aren't you, one of these rough followers of the criminal?
All hanging hereabout to gather how he's going to bear
Examination in the hall.' She flung disdainful glances on
The shabby figure standing at the fire with others there,
How she would have loved
A party to-day! -
Bright-hatted and gloved,
With table and tray
Thomas Hardy’s ‘Midnight on the Great Western’ is a powerful piece of poetry that examines the story of a young boy, traveling forward to an unknown destination from an unknown place.
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,
‘Moments of Vision’ by Thomas Hardy describes the times in a person’s life in which they are forced to reflect on who they are and what they’ve done.
That mirror
Which makes of men a transparency,
Who holds that mirror
And bids us such a breast-bared spectacle to see
Thomas Hardy’s ‘Neutral Tones’ is about the neutrality of feelings and passivity of a lady. The beauty of this poem lies in the use of imagery and most importantly the colors.
We stood by a pond that winter day,
And the sun was white, as though chidden of God,
And a few leaves lay on the starving sod;
– They had fallen from an ash, and were gray.
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