Thoughts of Phena
Thomas Hardy’s poem “Thoughts of Phena” was composed in 1890 and published in 1898 in his first volume of poetry, “Wessex Poems”.
Thomas Hardy was born on 2 June 1840 in Dorset, England, and he died on 11 January 1928 in Dorset, England, at the age of 87.A Victorian realist in the tradition of George Eliot, Hardy was influenced both in his novels and in his poetry by Romanticism. He was highly critical of much in Victorian society, especially on the declining status of rural people in Britain. While Hardy wrote poetry throughout his life and regarded himself primarily as a poet, his first collection was not published until 1898. Initially, he gained fame as the author of novels. Many of his novels concern tragic characters struggling against their passions and social circumstances.
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At News of Her Death Not a line of her writing have I, Not a thread of her hair, No mark of her late time as dame in her dwelling, whereby I may picture her there; And in vain do I urge my unsight To conceive my lost prize At her close, whom I knew when her dreams were upbrimming with light And with laughter her eyes. What scenes spread around her last days, Sad, shining, or dim? Did her gifts and compassions enray and enarch her sweet ways With an aureate nimb? Or did life-light decline from her years, And mischances control Her full day-star; unease, or regret, or forebodings, or fears Disennoble her soul? Thus I do but the phantom retain Of the maiden of yore As my relic; yet haply the best of her — fined in my brain It may be the more That no line of her writing have I, Nor a thread of her hair, No mark of her late time as dame in her dwelling, whereby I may picture her there.