Poem by Thomas Hardy

* * *

I met a man when night was nigh,
Who said, with shining face and eye
Like Moses’ after Sinai: –

‘I have seen the Moulder of Monarchies,
Realms, peoples, plains and hills,
Sitting upon the sunlit seas! –
And, as He sat, soliloquies
Fell from Him like an antiphonic breeze
That pricks the waves to thrills.

‘Meseemed that of the maimed and dead
Mown down upon the globe, –
Their plenteous blooms of promise shed
Ere fruiting-time – His words were said,
Sitting against the western web of red
Wrapt in His crimson robe.

‘And I could catch them now and then:
– “Why let these gambling clans
Of human Cockers, pit liege men
From mart and city, dale and glen,
In death-mains, but to swell and swell again
Their swollen All-Empery plans,
‘ “When a mere nod (if my malign
Compeer but passive keep)
Would mend that old mistake of mine
I made with Saul, and ever consign
All Lords of War whose sanctuaries enshrine
Liberticide, to sleep?

‘ “With violence the lands are spread
Even as in Israel’s day,
And it repenteth me I bred
Chartered armipotents lust-led
To feuds. . . . Yea, grieves my heart, as then I said,
To see their evil way!”

– ‘The utterance grew, and flapped like flame,
And further speech I feared;
But no Celestial tongued acclaim,
And no huzzas from earthlings came,
And the heavens mutely masked as ’twere in shame
Till daylight disappeared.’

Thus ended he as night rode high –
The man of shining face and eye,
Like Moses’ after Sinai.

1. Genitrix Laesa
2. V.R. 1819–1901
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4. Song from Heine
5. Song to an Old Burden

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