Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE STRANGE HOUSE, by THOMAS HARDY


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE STRANGE HOUSE, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: I hear the piano playing'
Last Line: "knew joy, or despair."


"I HEAR the piano playing --
Just as a ghost might play."
"-- O, but what are you saying?
There's no piano to-day;
Their old one was sold and broken;
Years past it went amiss."
"-- I heard it, or shouldn't have spoken:
A strange house, this!

"I catch some undertone here,
From some one out of sight."
"-- Impossible; we are alone here,
And shall be through the night."
"-- The parlour-door -- what stirred it?"
"-- No one: no soul's in range."
"-- But, anyhow, I heard it,
And it seems strange!

"Seek my own room I cannot --
A figure is on the stair!"
"-- What figure? Nay, I scan not
Any one lingering there.
A bough outside is waving,
And that's its shade by the moon."
"-- Well, all is strange! I am craving
Strength to leave soon."

"-- Ah, maybe you've some vision
Of showings beyond our sphere;
Some sight, sense, intuition
Of what once happened here?
The house is old; they've hinted
It once held two love-thralls,
And they may have imprinted
Their dreams on its walls?

"They were -- I think 'twas told me --
Queer in their works and ways;
The teller would often hold me
With weird tales of those days.
Some folk can not abide here,
But we -- we do not care
Who loved, laughed, wept, or died here,
Knew joy, or despair."





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