Book-bot.com - read famous books online for free

Late Lyrics and Earlier : with Many Other Verses by Thomas Hardy
page 163 of 212 (76%)
Like lead on each breast,
Should we cloak the tidings, or call her and tell?
It was too intense
A choice for our sense,
As we pondered and watched her we loved so well.

Yea, spirit failed us
At what assailed us;
How long, while seeing what soon must come,
Should we counterfeit
No knowledge of it,
And stay the stroke that would blanch and numb?

And thus, before
For evermore
Joy left her, we practised to beguile
Her innocence when
She now and again
Looked in, and smiled us another smile.



THE PASSER-BY
(L. H. RECALLS HER ROMANCE)



He used to pass, well-trimmed and brushed,
My window every day,
And when I smiled on him he blushed,
DigitalOcean Referral Badge