by Thomas Hardy¹

    Why did you give no hint that night

    That quickly after the morrow's dawn，

    And calmly， as if indifferent quite，

    You would close your term here， up and be gone

    Where I could not follow

    With wing of swallow

    To gain one glimpse of you ever anon！

    Never to bid good-bye

    Or lip me the softest call，

    Or utter a wish for a word， while I

    Saw morning harden upon the wall，

    Unmoved， unknowing

    That your great going

    Had place that moment， and altered all.

    Why do you make me leave the house

    And think for a breath it is you I see

    At the end of the alley² of bending boughs³

    Where so often at dusk you used to be；

    Till in darkening dankness

    The yawning blankness

    Of the perspective sickens me！

    You were she who abode⁴

    By those red-veined rocks far West，

    You were the swan-necked one who rode

    Along the beetling⁵ Beeny Crest⁶，

    And， reining⁷ nigh me，

    Would muse⁸ and eye me，

    While Life unrolled us its very best.

    Why， then， latterly did we not speak，

    Did we not think of those days long dead，

    And ere your vanishing strive to seek

    That time's renewal⁹？  We might have said，

    "In this bright spring weather

    We'll visit together

    Those places that once we visited."

    Well， well！  All's past amend¹⁰，

    Unchangeable.  It must go.

    I seem but a dead man held on end

    To sink down soon. . . .  O you could not know

    That such swift fleeing

    No soul foreseeing——

    Not even I——would undo¹¹ me so！

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