Y/M/D | Association | Description | Place | Locale | Food | Event | |
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1900/12/29 | Thomas Hardy | Author | "The Darkling Thrush" is published in The Graphic, a British weekly illustrated newspaper. |
Particulars for The Darkling Thrush (poem): | |||
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Art Type | Poem | writing that partakes of the nature of both speech and song that is typically rhythmical, usually metaphorical, and often exhibits such formal elements as meter, rhyme and stanzaic structure. |
By
I leant upon a coppice gate When Frost was spectre-grey,And Winter's dregs made desolate The weakening eye of day.The tangled bine-stems scored the sky Like strings of broken lyres,And all mankind that haunted nigh Had sought their household fires.
The land's sharp features seemed to be The Century's corpse outleant,His crypt the cloudy canopy, The wind his death-lament.The ancient pulse of germ and birth Was shrunken hard and dry,And every spirit upon earth Seemed fervourless as I.
At once a voice arose among The bleak twigs overheadIn a full-hearted evensong Of joy illimited;An aged thrush, frail, gaunt, and small, In blast-beruffled plume,Had chosen thus to fling his soul Upon the growing gloom.
So little cause for carolings Of such ecstatic soundWas written on terrestrial things Afar or nigh around,That I could think there trembled through His happy good-night airSome blessed Hope, whereof he knew And I was unaware.
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