Thomas Hardy: Poems Selected by Tom Paulin

Of course, Thomas Hardy (1840-1928) is best known for his prose work, with superb novels such as The Mayor of Casterbridge, Far From the Madding Crowd, Tess of the d'Urbervilles, and Jude the Obscure. I did not know that he also had an extensive poetic oeuvre. This booklet contains a selection. Compiler Tom Paulin makes it clear that his poetic work was just as important to Hardy, especially in the second half of his life. It shows: the most appealing poems date from after 1900. They are rather nostalgic and elegiac in nature, often musing about the inexorability of Time, or yearning for a lost loved one. In any case, they testify to a formal mastery of metrics and imagination. Paulin also makes it clear that also Hardy’s prose work show more had a clear poetic flavour. I am going to read his masterpieces with different eyes now.

As an example of this, the poem "Regret not me", published in 1914

Regret not me;
Beneath the sunny tree
I lie uncaring, slumbering peacefully.

Swift as the light
I flew my faery flight;
Ecstatically I moved, and feared no night.

I did not know
That heydays fade and go,
But deemed that what was would be always so.

I skipped at morn
Between the yellowing corn,
Thinking it good and glorious to be born.

I ran at eves
Among the piled-up sheaves,
Dreaming, "I grieve not, therefore nothing grieves."

Now soon will come
The apple, pear, and plum
And hinds will sing, and autumn insects hum.

Again you will fare
To cider-makings rare,
And junketings; but I shall not be there.

Yet gaily sing
Until the pewter ring
Those songs we sang when we went gipsying.

And lightly dance
Some triple-timed romance
In coupled figures, and forget mischance;

And mourn not me
Beneath the yellowing tree;
For I shall mind not, slumbering peacefully. show less