Poem by Thomas Hardy

He Inadvertently Cures His Love-Pains

             Song

I said: ‘O let me sing the praise
Of her who sweetly racks my days, –
Her I adore;
Her lips, her eyes, her moods, her ways!’

In miseries of pulse and pang
I strung my harp, and straightway sang
As none before: –
To wondrous words my quavers rang!

Thus I let heartaches lilt my verse,
Which suaged and soothed, and made disperse
The smarts I bore
To stagnance like a sepulchre’s.

But, eased, the days that thrilled ere then
Lost value; and I ask, O when,
And how, restore
Those old sweet agonies again!

1. Genitrix Laesa
2. Song from Heine
3. V.R. 1819–1901
4. Over the Coffin
5. Paths of Former Time

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