Poem by Thomas Hardy

The Last Performance

‘I am playing my oldest tunes,’ declared she,
‘All the old tunes I know, –
Those I learnt ever so long ago.’
– Why she should think just then she’d play them
Silence cloaks like snow.

When I returned from the town at nightfall
Notes continued to pour
As when I had left two hours before:
‘It’s the very last time,’ she said in closing;
‘From now I play no more.’

A few morns onward found her fading,
And, as her life outflew,
I thought of her playing her tunes right through;
And I felt she had known of what was coming,
And wondered how she knew.

1. The Supplanter
2. Afternoon Service at Mellstock
3. At the Word ‘Farewell’
4. Tragedian to Tragedienne
5. The Three Tall Men

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