Memory Lane

'Neutral Tones'

We stood by a pond that winter day,
And the sun was white, as though chidden of God,
And a few leaves lay on the starving sod,
- They had fallen from an ash, and were gray.

Your eyes on me were as eyes that rove
Over tedious riddles solved years ago;
And some words played between us to and fro -
On which lost the more by our love.

The smile on your mouth was the deadest thing
Alive enough to have strength to die;
And a grin of bitterness swept thereby
Like an ominous bird a-wing….

Since then, keen lessons that love deceives,
And wrings with wrong, have shaped to me
Your face, and the God-curst sun, and a tree,
And a pond edged with grayish leaves.

Thomas Hardy


I can remember being given this for a Practical Criticism exercise at school. I can remember working on it at home, a Sunday morning, autumn term - so October, November? I would have been 16? So, 1980?

Now, in 2007, I'm struck by line two - and the way the consonants and short 'i' of "chidden" work against "sun was white" and the strange - but lyrically lush - line 8 "On which lost the more by our love".

I've yet to find a better poem by Hardy. Let me know if you can think of another.