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Wessex Poems and Other Verses
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Though inner mischief worked amain,
She reached her husband’s side;
Where, toil-weary, as he had lain
Beneath the patchwork pied
When yestereve she’d forthward crept,
And as unwitting, still he slept
Who did in her confide.
A tear sprang as she turned and viewed
His features free from guile;
She kissed him long, as when, just wooed,
She chose his domicile.
She felt she could have given her life
To be the single-hearted wife
That she had been erstwhile.
Time wore to six. Her husband rose
And struck the steel and stone;
He glanced at Jenny, whose repose
Seemed deeper than his own.
With dumb dismay, on closer sight,
He gathered sense that in the night,
Or morn, her soul had flown.
When told that some too mighty strain
For one so many-yeared
Had burst her bosom’s master-vein,
His doubts remained unstirred.
His Jenny had not left his side
Betwixt the eve and morning-tide:
– The King’s said not a word.
Well! times are not as times were then,
Nor fair ones half so free;
And truly they were martial men,
The King’s-Own Cavalry.
And when they went from Casterbridge
And vanished over Mellstock Ridge,
’Twas saddest morn to see.
THE CASTERBRIDGE CAPTAINS
(KHYBER PASS, 1842)
A Tradition of J. B. L – , T. G. B – , AND J. L –
Three captains went to Indian wars,
And only one returned:
Their mate of yore, he singly wore
The laurels all had earned.
At home he sought the ancient aisle
Wherein, untrumped of fame,
The three had sat in pupilage,
And each had carved his name.
The names, rough-hewn, of equal size,
Stood on the panel still;
Unequal since. – “’Twas theirs to aim,
Mine was it to fulfil!”
– “Who saves his life shall lose it, friends!”
Outspake the preacher then,
Unweeting he his listener, who
Looked at the names again.
That he had come and they’d been stayed,
’Twas but the chance of war:
Another chance, and they’d sat here,
And he had lain afar.
Yet saw he something in the lives
Of those who’d ceased to live
That sphered them with a majesty
Which living failed to give.
Transcendent triumph in return
No longer lit his brain;
Transcendence rayed the distant urn
Where slept the fallen twain.
A SIGN-SEEKER
I mark the months in liveries dank and dry,
The noontides many-shaped and hued;
I see the nightfall shades subtrude,
And hear the monotonous hours clang negligently by.
I view the evening bonfires of the sun
On hills where morning rains have hissed;
The eyeless countenance of the mist
Pallidly rising when the summer droughts are done.
I have seen the lightning-blade, the leaping star,
The cauldrons of the sea in storm,
Have felt the earthquake’s lifting arm,
And trodden where abysmal fires and snow-cones are.
I learn to prophesy the hid eclipse,
The coming of eccentric orbs;
She reached her husband’s side;
Where, toil-weary, as he had lain
Beneath the patchwork pied
When yestereve she’d forthward crept,
And as unwitting, still he slept
Who did in her confide.
A tear sprang as she turned and viewed
His features free from guile;
She kissed him long, as when, just wooed,
She chose his domicile.
She felt she could have given her life
To be the single-hearted wife
That she had been erstwhile.
Time wore to six. Her husband rose
And struck the steel and stone;
He glanced at Jenny, whose repose
Seemed deeper than his own.
With dumb dismay, on closer sight,
He gathered sense that in the night,
Or morn, her soul had flown.
When told that some too mighty strain
For one so many-yeared
Had burst her bosom’s master-vein,
His doubts remained unstirred.
His Jenny had not left his side
Betwixt the eve and morning-tide:
– The King’s said not a word.
Well! times are not as times were then,
Nor fair ones half so free;
And truly they were martial men,
The King’s-Own Cavalry.
And when they went from Casterbridge
And vanished over Mellstock Ridge,
’Twas saddest morn to see.
THE CASTERBRIDGE CAPTAINS
(KHYBER PASS, 1842)
A Tradition of J. B. L – , T. G. B – , AND J. L –
Three captains went to Indian wars,
And only one returned:
Their mate of yore, he singly wore
The laurels all had earned.
At home he sought the ancient aisle
Wherein, untrumped of fame,
The three had sat in pupilage,
And each had carved his name.
The names, rough-hewn, of equal size,
Stood on the panel still;
Unequal since. – “’Twas theirs to aim,
Mine was it to fulfil!”
– “Who saves his life shall lose it, friends!”
Outspake the preacher then,
Unweeting he his listener, who
Looked at the names again.
That he had come and they’d been stayed,
’Twas but the chance of war:
Another chance, and they’d sat here,
And he had lain afar.
Yet saw he something in the lives
Of those who’d ceased to live
That sphered them with a majesty
Which living failed to give.
Transcendent triumph in return
No longer lit his brain;
Transcendence rayed the distant urn
Where slept the fallen twain.
A SIGN-SEEKER
I mark the months in liveries dank and dry,
The noontides many-shaped and hued;
I see the nightfall shades subtrude,
And hear the monotonous hours clang negligently by.
I view the evening bonfires of the sun
On hills where morning rains have hissed;
The eyeless countenance of the mist
Pallidly rising when the summer droughts are done.
I have seen the lightning-blade, the leaping star,
The cauldrons of the sea in storm,
Have felt the earthquake’s lifting arm,
And trodden where abysmal fires and snow-cones are.
I learn to prophesy the hid eclipse,
The coming of eccentric orbs;
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Последний отзыв
Удивительная книга. Как никогда актуальна сегодня. Язык и стиль автора настолько тонок, лёгок и изыскан, что легко поведёт читателя в мир героев, кото...
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