Thomas Hardy (1840-1928)
Fragment
1At last I entered a long dark gallery,
2 Catacomb-lined; and ranged at the side
3 Were the bodies of men from far and wide
4Who, motion past, were nevertheless not dead.
5 "The sense of waiting here strikes strong;
6Everyone's waiting, waiting, it seems to me;
7 What are you waiting for so long? --
8 What is to happen?" I said.
9"O we are waiting for one called God," said they,
10 "(Though by some the Will, or Force, or Laws;
11 And, vaguely, by some, the Ultimate Cause;)
12Waiting for him to see us before we are clay.
13 Yes; waiting, waiting, for God to know it." ...
14 "To know what?" questioned I.
15"To know how things have been going on earth and below it:
16 It is clear he must know some day."
17 I thereon asked them why.
18"Since he made us humble pioneers
19Of himself in consciousness of Life's tears,
20It needs no mighty prophecy
21To tell that what he could mindlessly show
22His creatures, he himself will know.
23"By some still close-cowled mystery
24We have reached feeling faster than he,
25But he will overtake us anon,
26 If the world goes on."
Notes
2] Catacomb: recesses holding tombs.
4] motion past: "motionless" in 1917.
13] There is no blank line in the 1917 version between lines 13-14.
Online text copyright © 2009, Ian Lancashire (the Department of English) and the University of Toronto.
Published by the Web Development Group, Information Technology Services, University of Toronto Libraries.
Original text: Collected Poems of Thomas Hardy (London: Macmillan and Co., 1932): 482. PR 4741 F32 Robarts Library.
First publication date:
1917
Publication date note: Moments of Vision and Miscellaneous Verses (London: Macmillan, 1917): 174-75. H378 M645 1917 Fisher Rare Book Library
RPO poem editor: Ian Lancashire
RP edition: RPO 1998.
Recent editing: 2:2002/2/13
Rhyme: aabb
Other poems by Thomas Hardy
