Poem by Thomas Hardy

The Missed Train

How I was caught
Hieing home, after days of allure,
And forced to an inn – small, obscure –
At the junction, gloom-fraught.

How civil my face
To get them to chamber me there –
A roof I had scorned, scarce aware
That it stood at the place.

And how all the night
I had dreams of the unwitting cause
Of my lodgment. How lonely I was;
How consoled by her sprite!

Thus onetime to me . . .
Dim wastes of dead years bar away
Then from now. But such happenings to-day
Fall to lovers, may be!

Years, years as shoaled seas,
Truly, stretch now between! Less and less
Shrink the visions then vast in me. – Yes,
Then in me: Now in these.

1. The Supplanter
2. Afternoon Service at Mellstock
3. At the Word ‘Farewell’
4. The Children and Sir Nameless
5. Tragedian to Tragedienne

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