Classic and Contemporary Poetry
THE COLLECTOR CLEANS HIS PICTURE, by THOMAS HARDY Poet Analysis Poet's Biography First Line: How I remember cleaning that strange picture! Last Line: From the adjacent steeple. Subject(s): Collectors & Collecting; Paintings & Painters | ||||||||
HOW I remember cleaning that strange picture!. . . I had been deep in duty for my sick neighbour -- His besides my own -- over several Sundays, Often, too, in the week; so with parish pressures, Baptisms, burials, doctorings, conjugal counsel -- All the whatnots asked of a rural parson -- Faith, I was well-nigh broken, should have been fully Saving for one small secret relaxation, One that in mounting manhood had grown my hobby. This was to delve at whiles for easel-lumber, Stowed in the backmost slums of a soon-reached city, Merely on chance to uncloak some worthy canvas, Panel, or plaque, blacked blind by uncouth adventure, Yet under all concealing a precious artfeat. Such I had found not yet. My latest capture Came from the rooms of a trader in ancient house-gear Who had no scent of beauty or soul for brushcraft. Only a tittle cost it -- murked with grimefilms, Gatherings of slow years, thick-varnished over, Never a feature manifest of man's painting. So, one Saturday, time ticking hard on midnight Ere an hour subserved, I set me upon it. Long with coiled-up sleeves I cleaned and yet cleaned, Till a first fresh spot, a high light, looked forth, Then another, like fair flesh, and another; Then a curve, a nostril, and next a finger, Tapering, shapely, significantly pointing slantwise. "Flemish?" I said. "Nay, Spanish. . . . But, nay, Italian!" -- Then meseemed it the guise of the ranker Venus, Named of some Astarte, of some Cotytto. Down I knelt before it and kissed the panel, Drunk with the lure of love's inhibited dreamings. Till the dawn I rubbed, when there leered up at me A hag, that had slowly emerged from under my hands there, Pointing the slanted finger towards a bosom Eaten away of a rot from the lusts of a lifetime. . . -- I could have ended myself at the lashing lesson! Stunned I sat till roused by a clear-voiced bell-chime, Fresh and sweet as the dew-fleece under my luthern. It was the matin service calling to me From the adjacent steeple. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...1801: AMONG THE PAPERS OF THE ENVOY TO CONSTANTINOPLE by RICHARD HOWARD VENETIAN INTERIOR, 1889 by RICHARD HOWARD THERE IS A GOLD LIGHT IN CERTAIN OLD PAINTINGS by DONALD JUSTICE DUTCH INTERIORS by JANE KENYON INVITATION TO A PAINTER: 3 by WILLIAM ALLINGHAM THE CHINA PAINTERS by TED KOOSER ELEGY FOR SOL LEWITT by ANN LAUTERBACH ON THE SEPARATION OF ADAM AND EVE by TIMOTHY LIU AND THERE WAS A GREAT CALM' by THOMAS HARDY |
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