Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, GENOA AND THE MEDITERRANEAN, by THOMAS HARDY


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

GENOA AND THE MEDITERRANEAN, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: O epic-famed, god-haunted central sea
Last Line: Where lovers first behold thy form in pilgrimage to thee.
Subject(s): Genoa, Italy; Mediterranean Sea


(March 1887)

O EPIC-FAMED, god-haunted Central Sea,
Heave careless of the deep wrong done to thee
When from Torino's track I saw thy face first flash on me.

And multimarbled Genova the Proud,
Gleam all unconscious how, wide-lipped, up-browed,
I first beheld thee clad - not as the Beauty but the Dowd.

Out from a deep-delved way my vision lit
On housebacks pink, green, ochreous - where a slit
Shoreward 'twixt row and row revealed the classic blue through it.

And thereacross waved fishwives' high-hung smocks,
Chrome kerchiefs, scarlet hose, darned underfrocks;
Often since when my dreams of thee, O Queen, that frippery mocks:

Whereat I grieve, Superba!... Afterhours
Within Palazzo Doria's orange bowers
Went far to mend these marrings of thy soul-subliming powers.

But, Queen, such squalid undress none should see,
Those dream-endangering eyewounds no more be
Where lovers first behold thy form in pilgrimage to thee.





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