Satires of Circumstance in Fifteen Glimpses I -- At Tea The kettle descants in a cosy drone, And the young wife looks in her husband's face, And then in her guest's, and shows in her own Her sense that she fills an envied place; And the visiting lady is all abloom, And says there was never so sweet a room. And the happy young housewife does not know That the woman beside her was his first choice, Till the fates ordained it could not be so... Betraying nothing in look or voice The guest sits smiling and sips her tea, And he throws her a stray glance yearningly. II -- In Church "And now to God the Father," he ends, And his voice thrills up to the topmost tiles: Each listener chokes as he bows and bends, And emotion pervades the crowded aisles. Then the preacher glides to the vestry-door, And shuts it, and thinks he is seen no more. The door swings softly ajar meanwhile, And a pupil of his in the Bible class, Who adores him as one without gloss or guile, Sees her idol stand with a satisfied smile And re-enact at the vestry-glass Each pulpit-gesture in deaf dumb-show That had moved the congregation so. III -- By Her Aunt's Grave "Sixpence a week," says a girl to her lover, "Aunt used to bring me, for she could confide In me alone, she vowed. 'Twas to cover The cost of her headstone when she died. And that was a year ago last June; I've not yet fixed it, but I must soon." "And where is the money now, my dear?" "O, snug in my purse... Aunt was so slow In saving it -- eighty weeks or near..." "Let's spend it," he hints. "For she won't know There's a dance to-night at the Load of Hay." She passively nods, and they go that way. IV -- In the Room of the Bride-Elect "Would it had been the man of our wish!" Sighs her mother. To whom with vehemence she In the wedding-dress -- the wife to be -- "Then why were you so mollyish As not to insist on him for me!" The mother, amazed: "Why, dearest one, Because you pleaded for this or none!" "But father and you should have stood out strong! Since then, to my cost, I have lived to find That you were right and I was wrong; This man is a dolt to the one declined... Ah! -- here he comes with his button-hole rose. Good God -- I must marry him I suppose!" V -- At a Watering Place They sit and smoke on the esplanade, The man and his friend, and regard the bay Where the far chalk cliffs, to the left displayed, Smile shallowly in the decline of day. And saunterers pass with laugh and jest -- A handsome couple among the rest. "That smart proud pair," said the man to his friend, "Are to marry next week... How little he thinks That dozens of days and nights on end I have stroked her neck, unhooked the links Of her sleeve to get at her upper arm... Well, bliss is in ignorance: what's the harm!" VI -- In the Cemetery "You see those mothers squabbling there?" Remarks the man of the cemetery. "One says in tears, 'Tis mine lies here!' Another, 'Nay mine, you Pharisee!' Another, 'How dare you move my flowers And put your own on this grave of ours!' But all their children were laid therein At different times, like sprats in a tin." "And then the main drain had to cross, And we moved the lost some nights ago, And packed them away in the general foss With hundreds more. But their folks don't know, And as well cry over a new-laid drain As anything else, to ease your pain!" VII -- Outside the Window "My stick!" he says, and turns in the lane To the house just left, whence a vixen voice Comes out with the firelight through the pane, And he sees within that the girl of his choice Stands rating her mother with eyes aglare For something said while he was there. "At last I behold her soul undraped!" Thinks the man who had loved her more than himself; "My God! -- tis but narrowly I have escaped. -- My precious porcelain proves it delf." His face has reddened like one ashamed, And he steels off, leaving his stick unclaimed. VIII -- In the Study He enters, and mute on the edge of a chair Sits a thin-faced lady, a stranger there, A type of decayed gentility; And by some small signs he well can guess That she comes to him almost breakfastless. "I have called -- I hope I do not err -- I am looking for a purchaser Of some score volumes of the works Of eminent divines I own, -- Left by my father -- though it irks My patience to offer them." And she smiles As if necessity were unknown; "But the truth of it is that oftenwhiles I have wished, as I am fond of art, To make my rooms a little smart, And these old books are so in the way." And lightly still she laughs to him, As if to sell where a mere gay whim, And that, to be frank, Life were indeed To her not vinegar and gall, But fresh and honey-like; and Need No household skeleton at all. IX -- At the Altar-Rail "My bride is not coming, alas!" says the groom And the telegram shakes in his hand. "I own It was hurried! We met at a dancing-room When I went to the Cattle-Show alone, And then, next night, where the Fountain leaps, And the Street of the Quarter-Circle sweeps." "Ay, she won me to ask her to be my wife -- 'Twas foolish perhaps! -- to forsake the ways Of the flaring town for a farmer's life. She agreed. And we fixed it. Now she says: 'It's sweet of you, dear, to prepare me a nest, But a swift, short, gay life suits me best. What I really am you have never gleaned; I had eaten the apple ere you were weaned.'" X -- In the Nupital Chamber "O that mastering tune!" And up in the bed Like a lace-robed phantom springs the bride; "And why?" asks the man she had that day wed, With a start, as the band plays on outside. "It's the townsfolk's cheery compliment Because of our marriage, my Innocent." "O but you don't know! 'Tis the passionate air To which my old Love waltzed with me, And I swore as we spun that none should share My home, my kisses, till death, save he! And he dominates me and thrills me through, And it's he I embrace while embracing you!" XI -- In the Restaurant "But hear. If you stay, and the child be born, It will pass as your husband's with the rest, While, if we fly, the teeth of scorn Will be gleaming at us from east to west; And the child will come as a life despised; I feel an elopement is ill-advised!" "O you realise not what it is, my dear, To a woman! Daily and hourly alarms Lest the truth should out. How can I stay here And nightly take him into my arms! Come to the child no name or fame, Let us go, and face it, and bear the shame." XII -- At the Draper's "I stood at the back of the shop, my dear, But you did not perceive me. Well, when they deliver what you were shown I shall know nothing of it, believe me!" And he coughed and coughed as she paled and said, "O, I didn't see you come in there -- Why couldn't you speak? -- 'Well, I didn't. I left That you should not notice I'd been there.'" "You were viewing some lovely things. 'Soon required For a widow, of latest fashion;' And I knew 'twould upset you to meet the man Who had to be cold and ashen" "And screwed in a box before thy could dress you 'In the latest new note in mourning,' As they defined it. So, not to distress you, I left you to your adorning." XIII -- On the Death-Bed "I'LL tell -- being past all praying for -- Then promptly die... He was out at the war, And got some scent of the intimacy That was under way between her and me; And he stole back home, and appeared like a ghost One night, at the very time almost That I reached her house. Well, I shot him dead, And secretly buried him. Nothing was said." "The news of the battle came next day; He was scheduled missing. I hurried away, Got out there, visited the field, And sent home word that a search revealed He was one of the slain; though, lying alone And stript, his body had not been known." "But she suspected. I lost her love, Yea, my hope of earth, and of Heaven above; And my time's now come, and I'll pay the score, Though it be burning for evermore." XIV -- Over the Coffin They stand confronting, the coffin between, His wife of old, and his wife of late, And the dead man whose both they had been Seems listening aloof, as to things past date. -- "I have called," says the first. "Do you marvel or not?" "In truth," says the second, "I do -- somewhat." "Well, there was a word to be said by me!... I divorced that man because of you -- It seemed I must do it, boundenly; But now I am older, and tell you true, For life is little, and dead lies he; I would I had let alone you two! And both of us, scorning parochial ways, Had lived like the wives in the patriarch's days." XV -- In the Moonlight "O lonely workman, standing there In a dream, why do you stare and stare At her grave, as no other grave there were?" "If your great gaunt eyes so importune Her soul by the shine of this corpse-cold moon Maybe you'll raise her phantom soon!" "Why, fool, it is what I would rather see Than all the living folk there be; But alas, there is no such joy for me!" "Ah -- she was one you loved, no doubt, Through good and evil, through rain and drought, And when she passed, all your sun went out?" "Nay: she was the woman I did not love, Whom all the others were ranked above, Whom during life I thought nothing of." Thomas Hardy 1914 -- _______ ____________ E-mail: [email protected] ,,/\/ / \/ // / / \ http://darkshadows.org/~skyhawk =\\\\\\\============================- #define QUESTION ((bb) || !(bb)) ``\ \ \\ \ \ /\ \ / ----- ------------ --- --

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