THE VARIORUM EDITION OF THE COMPLETE POEMS OF THOMAS HARDY THE V ariorun1 Edition OF THE Complete Poems OF THOMAS HARDY EDITED BY James Gibson M THE VARIORUM EDITION OF THE COMPLETE POEMS OF THOMAS HARDY Poems 1-919, 925--6, 929-34 and 943, Thomas Hardy's prefaces and notes © Macmillan London Ltd Poems 920-4, 927-8, 935-42 and 944-7 © Trustees of the Hardy Estate Editorial arrangement © Macmillan London Ltd 1976, 1979 Introduction and editorial matter ©James Gibson 1979 Typography © Macmillan London Ltd 1976, 1979 Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 1979 978-0-333-23773-1 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without permission. ISBN 978-1-349-03806-0 ISBN 978-1-349-03804-6 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-1-349-03804-6 The Variorum Edition first published in 1979 by MACMILLAN LONDON LIMITED 4 Little Essex Street London WC2R 3LF and Basingstoke Associated companies in Delhi, Dublin, Hong Kong, johannesburg, Lagos, Melbourne, New York, Singapore and Tokyo Typeset by WESTERN PRINTING SERVICES L TO, BRISTOL Contents LIST OF MANUSCRIPT My Cicely 51 ILLUSTRATIONS page xvii Her Immortality 55 INTRODUCTION XIX The Ivy-Wife 57 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS XXXlll A Meeting with Despair 57 NOTES FOR USERS OF THE Unknowing 58 VARIORUM XXXV Friends Beyond 59 To Outer Nature 61 Domicilium 3 Thoughts of Phena 62 Middle-Age Enthusiasms 63 Wessex Poems and Other Verses In a Wood 64 Preface 6 To a Lady 65 The Temporary the All 7 To a Motherless Child 65 Amabel 8 Nature's Questioning 66 Hap 9 The Impercipient 67 In Vision I Roamed 9 At an Inn 68 At a Bridal 10 The Slow Nature 69 Postponement 11 In a Eweleaze near Weatherbury 70 A Confession to a Friend in Trouble 11 The Bride-Night Fire 71 Neutral Tones 12 Heiress and Architect 75 She at His Funeral 12 The Two Men 77 Her Initials 13 Lines 79 Her Dilemma 13 I Look Into My Glass 81 Revulsion 14 She, to Him I 14 Poems of the Past and the Present She, to Him II 15 Preface 84 She, to Him III 15 V.R. 1819-1901 85 She, to Him IV 16 Ditty 17 War Poems The Sergeant's Song 18 Embarcation 86 Valenciennes 19 Departure 86 San Sebastian 21 The Colonel's Soliloquy 87 The Stranger's Song 23 The Going of the Battery 88 The Burghers 24 At the War Office, London 89 Leipzig 26 A Christmas Ghost-Story 90 The Peasant's Confession 31 Drummer Hodge 90 The Alarm 35 A Wife in London 91 Her Death and After 39 The Souls of the Slain 92 The Dance at the Phrenix 43 Song of the Soldiers' Wives and The Casterbridge Captains 48 Sweethearts 96 A Sign-Seeker 49 The Sick Battle-God 97 vi COMPLETE POEMS A Spot Poems cif Pilgrimage 139 Long Plighted 140 Genoa and the Mediterranean 100 The Widow Betrothed 141 Shelley's Skylark 101 At a Hasty Wedding 142 In the Old Theatre, Fiesole 102 The Dream-Follower 143 Rome: On the Palatine 102 His Immortality 143 Building a New Street in the The To-Be-Forgotten 144 Ancient Quarter 103 Wives in the Sere 145 The Vatican: Sal a delle Muse 103 The Superseded 146 At the Pyramid of Cestius near the An August Midnight 146 Graves of Shelley and Keats 104 The Caged Thrush Freed and Lausanne: In Gibbon's Old Garden: Home Again 147 11-12 p.m. 105 Birds at Winter Nightfall 148 Zermatt: To the Matterhorn 106 The Puzzled Game-Birds 148 The Bridge of Lodi 107 Winter in Durnover Field 148 On an Invitation to the United States 110 The Last Chrysanthemum 149 The Darkling Thrush 150 Miscellaneous Poems The Comet at Yell'ham 151 Mad Judy 151 The Mother Mourns 111 A Was ted Illness 152 I Said to Love 114 A Man 153 A Commonplace Day 115 The Dame of Athelhall 154 At a Lunar Eclipse 116 The Seasons of Her Year 156 The Lacking Sense 116 The Milkmaid 157 To Life 118 The Levelled Churchyard 157 Doom and She 118 The Ruined Maid 158 The Problem 120 The Respectable Burgher 159 The Subalterns 120 Architectural Masks 160 The Sleep-Worker 121 The Tenant-for-Life 161 The Bullfinches 122 The King's Experiment 162 God-Forgotten 123 The Tree 163 The Bedridden Peasant 124 Her Late Husband 165 By the Earth's Corpse 126 The Self-Unseeing 166 Mute Opinion 127 In Tenebris I 167 To an Unborn Pauper Child 127 In Tenebris II 168 To Flowers from Italy in Winter 129 In Tenebris III 169 On a Fine Morning 129 The Church-Builder 170 To Lizbie Browne 130 The Lost Pyx 173 Song ofHope 132 Tess's Lament 175 The Well-Beloved 133 The Supplanter 177 Her Reproach 135 The Inconsistent 135 A Broken Appointment 136 Imitations, etc. Between Us Now 136 Sapphic Fragment 181 How Great My Grief 137 Catullus: XXXI 181 I Need Not Go 138 After Schiller 182 The Coquette, and After 139 Song from Heine 182 CONTENTS vii From Victor Hugo 182 The Conformers 229 Cardinal Bembo's Epitaph on The Dawn after the Dance 230 Raphael 183 The Sun on the Letter 231 The Night of the Dance 231 Retrospect Misconception 232 The Voice of the Thorn I Have Lived with Shades 184 233 From Her in the Country 234 Memory and I 185 Her Confession 'AFNQETQI 8EQI 186 234 To an Impersonator of Rosalind 235 To an Actress 235 The Minute before Meeting 236 Time's Laughingstocks and Other Verses He Abjures Love 236 Time's Laughingstocks A Set cif Country Songs Preface 190 Let Me Enjoy 238 The Revisitation 191 At Casterbridge Fair 239 A Trampwoman's Tragedy 195 I. The Ballad Singer 239 The Two Rosalinds 199 II. Former Beauties 239 A Sunday Morning Tragedy 201 III. After the Club-Dance 240 The House of Hospitalities 206 IV. The Market-Girl 240 Bereft 206 V. The Inquiry 241 John and Jane 207 VI. A Wife Waits 241 The Curate's Kindness 208 VII. After the Fair 242 The Flirt's Tragedy 210 The Dark-Eyed Gentleman 243 The Rejected Member's Wife 213 To Carrey Clavel 244 The Farm-Woman's Winter 214 The Orphaned Old Maid 244 Autumn in King's Hintock Park 215 The Spring Call 244 Shut Out That Moon 216 Julie-Jane 245 Reminiscences of a Dancing Man 216 News for Her Mother 246 The Dead Man Walking 217 The Fiddler 248 The Husband's View 248 More Love Lyrics Rose-Ann 249 1967 220 The Homecoming 250 Her Definition 220 The Division 221 Pieces Occasional and Various On the Departure Platform 221 In a Cathedral City 222 A Church Romance 252 I Say, 'I'll Seek Her 222 The Rash Bride 252 Her Father 223 The Dead Quire 255 At Waking 224 The Christening 260 Four Footprints 225 A Dream Question 261 In the Vaulted Way 225 By the Barrows 262 In the Mind's Eye 226 A Wife and Another 262 The End of the Episode 226 The Roman Road 264 The Sigh 227 The V ampirine Fair 265 In the Night She Came 228 The Reminder 268 viii COMPLETE POEMS The Rambler 269 Wessex Heights 319 Night in the Old Home 269 In Death Divided 320 After the Last Breath 270 The Place on the Map 321 In Childbed 271 The Schreckhorn 322 The Pine Planters 271 A Singer Asleep 323 The Dear 274 A Plaint to Man 325 One We Knew 274 God's Funeral 326 She Hears the Storm 275 Spectres that Grieve 329 A Wet Night 276 Ah, Are You Digging on My Before Life and After 277 Grave? 330 New Year's Eve 277 Self-Unconscious 331 God's Education 278 The Discovery 332 To Sincerity 279 Tolerance 333 Panthera 280 Before and after Summer 333 The Unborn 286 At Day-Close in November 334 The Man He Killed 287 The Year's Awakening 335 Geographical Knowledge 287 Under the Waterfall 335 One Ralph Blossom Soliloquizes 288 The Noble Lady's Tale 289 Poems of 1912-13 Unrealized 296 Wagtail and Baby 296 The Going 338 Aberdeen 297 Your Last Drive 339 George Meredith 297 The Walk 340 Yell'ham-Wood's Story 298 Rain on a Grave 341 A Young Man's Epigram on I Found Her Out There 342 Existence 299 Without Ceremony 343 Lament 344 The Haunter 345 Satires cif Circumstance, Lyrics and Reveries The Voice 346 His Visitor 347 Lyrics and Reveries A Circular 347 In Front of the Landscape 303 A Dream or No 348 Channel Firing 305 After a Journey 349 The Convergence of the Twain 306 A Death-Day Recalled 350 The Ghost of the Past 308 Beeny Cliff 350 After the Visit 309 At Castle Boterel 351 To Meet, or Otherwise 310 Places 352 The Difference 311 The Phantom Horsewoman 353 The Sun on the Bookcase 311 The Spell of the Rose 355 When I Set Out for Lyonnesse 312 St Launce's Revisited 356 A Thunderstorm in Town 312 Where the Picnic Was 357 The Torn Letter 313 Beyond the Last Lamp 314 Miscellaneous Pieces The Face at the Casement 315 Lost Love 318 The Wistful Lady 359 My Spirit Will Not Haunt the The Woman in the Rye 360 Mound 318 The Cheval-Glass 360 CONTENTS ix The Re-Enactment 361 VIII. In the Study 419 Her Secret 365 IX.