On the Belgian Expatriation

O

Thomas Hardy

October 18, 1914

I dreamt that people from the Land of Chimes

Arrived one autumn morning with their bells,

To hoist them on the towers and citadels

Of my own country, that the musical rhymes

Rung by them into space at meted times

Amid the market's daily stir and stress,

And the night's empty star-lit silentness,

Might solace souls of this and kindred climes.

Then I awoke; and lo, before me stood

The visioned ones, but pale and full of fear;

From Bruges they came, and Antwerp, and Ostend,

No carillons in their train. Foes of mad mood

Had shattered these to shards amid the gear

Of ravaged roof, and smouldering gable-end.

Rating:

Comment form:

Similar Poems:

In October 1914 Antwerp by Ford Madox Ford

Ford Madox Ford

I
GLOOM!
An October like November;
August a hundred thousand hours,
And all September,
A hundred thousand, dragging sunlit days,
And half October like a thousand years . . .
And doom!
That then was Antwerp. . .
In the name of God,
How could they do it?
Those souls that usually dived
Into the dirty caverns of mines;
Who usually hived
In whitened hovels; under ragged poplars;

140

Rating:

Feuilleton 5: The Buskers by Christopher Middleton

Christopher Middleton

Four buskers almost balkanized, tonight,
August 4th, the Place de la Contrescarpe.

Every one of them in wind and limb complete,
The accordionist all but a hunchback--

After the first melodious flourishes were done,
The clarinet began to take his instrument apart,

Blowing shorter tunes, to show the way it worked;
But on a keyboard hanging from his neck

140

Rating: