Poem by Thomas Hardy

God’s Education

I saw him steal the light away
That haunted in her eye:
It went so gently none could say
More than that it was there one day
And missing by-and-by.

I watched her longer, and he stole
Her lily tincts and rose;
All her young sprightliness of soul
Next fell beneath his cold control,
And disappeared like those.

I asked: ‘Why do you serve her so?
Do you, for some glad day,
Hoard these her sweets – ?’ He said, ‘O no,
They charm not me; I bid Time throw
Them carelessly away.’

Said I: ‘We call that cruelty –
We, your poor mortal kind.’
He mused. ‘The thought is new to me.
Forsooth, though I men’s master be,
Theirs is the teaching mind!’

1. Genitrix Laesa
2. V.R. 1819–1901
3. Song from Heine
4. Over the Coffin
5. Song to an Old Burden

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