Classic and Contemporary Poetry
AT PAUSE IN A COUNTRY DANCE (MIDDLE OF LAST CENTURY), by THOMAS HARDY Poet Analysis Poet's Biography First Line: They stood at the foot of the figure Last Line: In elbow-chairs through the slow night. | ||||||||
THEY stood at the foot of the figure, And panted: they'd danced it down through -- That "Dashing White Serjeant" they loved so: -- A window, uncurtained, was nigh them That end of the room. Thence in view Outside it a valley updrew, Where the frozen moon lit frozen snow: At the furthermost reach of the valley A light from a window shone low. "They are inside that window," said she, As she looked. "They sit up there for me; And baby is sleeping there, too." He glanced. "Yes," he said. "Never mind," Let's foot our way up again; do! And dance down the line as before. "What's the world to us, meeting once more!" "-- Not much, when your husband full trusts you, And thinks the child his that I bore!" He was silent. The fiddlers six-eighted With even more passionate vigour. The pair swept again up the figure, The child's cuckoo-father and she, And the next couples threaded below, And the twain wove their way to the top Of "The Dashing White Serjeant" they loved so, Restarting: right, left, to and fro. -- From the homestead, seen yon, the small glow Still adventured forth over the white, Where the child slept, unknowing who sired it, In the cradle of wicker tucked tight, And its grandparents, nodding, admired it In elbow-chairs through the slow night. | 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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