Classic and Contemporary Poetry
AN EAST-END CURATE, by THOMAS HARDY Poet Analysis Poet's Biography First Line: A small blind street off east commercial road Last Line: But stoops along abstractedly, for good, or in vain, god wot! | ||||||||
A SMALL blind street off East Commercial Road; Window, door; window, door; Every house like the one before, Is where the curate, Mr. Dowle, has found a pinched abode. Spectacled, pale, moustache straw-coloured, and with a long thin face, Day or dark his lodgings' narrow doorstep does he pace. A bleached pianoforte, with its drawn silk plaitings faded, Stands in his room, its keys much yellowed, cyphering, and abraded, "Novello's Anthems" lie at hand, and also a few glees, And "Laws of Heaven for Earth" in a frame upon the wall one sees. He goes through his neighbours' houses as his own, and none regards, And opens their back-doors off-hand, to look for them in their yards: A man is threatening his wife on the other side of the wall, But the curate lets it pass as knowing the history of it all. Freely within his hearing the children skip and laugh and say: "There's Mister Dow-well! There's Mister Dow-well!" in their play; And the long, pallid, devoted face notes not, But stoops along abstractedly, for good, or in vain, God wot! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...MEN WHO MARCH AWAY' (SONG OF THE SOLDIERS) by THOMAS HARDY A BROKEN APPOINTMENT by THOMAS HARDY A CHRISTMAS GHOST-STORY; CHRISTMAS-EVE 1899 by THOMAS HARDY A THOUGHT IN TWO MOODS by THOMAS HARDY A THUNDERSTORM IN TOWN by THOMAS HARDY A TRAMPWOMAN'S TRAGEDY by THOMAS HARDY A WIFE IN LONDON by THOMAS HARDY ACCORDING TO THE MIGHTY WORKING by THOMAS HARDY |
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