Poem by Thomas Hardy

I Am the One

I am the one whom ringdoves see
Through chinks in boughs
When they do not rouse
In sudden dread,
But stay on cooing, as if they said:
‘Oh; it’s only he.’

I am the passer when up-eared hares,
Stirred as they eat
The new-sprung wheat,
Their munch resume
As if they thought: ‘He is one for whom
Nobody cares.’

Wet-eyed mourners glance at me
As in train they pass
Along the grass
To a hollowed spot,
And think: ‘No matter; he quizzes not
Our misery.’

I hear above: ‘We stars must lend
No fierce regard
To his gaze, so hard
Bent on us thus, –
Must scathe him not. He is one with us
Beginning and end.’

1. The Country Wedding
2. Life and Death at Sunrise
3. The Aërolite
4. Genitrix Laesa
5. V.R. 1819–1901

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