Thomas Hardy — The Mother Mourns

When mid-autumn's moan shook the night-time,         And sedges were horny, And summer's green wonderwork faltered         On leaze and in lane, I fared Yell'ham-Firs way, where dimly         Came wheeling around me Those phantoms obscure and insistent         That shadows unchain. Till airs from the needle-thicks brought me         A low lamentation, As 'twere of a tree-god disheartened,         Perplexed, or in pain. And, heeding, it awed me to gather         That Nature herself there Was breathing in aerie accents,         With dirgeful refrain, Weary plaint that Mankind, in these late days,         Had grieved her by holding Her ancient high fame of perfection         In doubt and disdain . . . - "I had not proposed me a Creature         (She soughed) so excelling All else of my kingdom in compass         And brightness of brain "As to read my defects with a god-glance,         Uncover each vestige Of old inadvertence, annunciate         Each flaw and each stain! "My purpose went not to develop         Such insight in Earthland; Such potent appraisements affront me,         And sadden my reign! "Why loosened I olden control here         To mechanize skywards, Undeeming great scope could outshape in         A globe of such grain? "Man's mountings of mind-sight I checked not,         Till range of his vision Has topped my intent, and found blemish         Throughout my domain. "He holds as inept his own soul-shell -         My deftest achievement - Contemns me for fitful inventions         Ill-timed and inane: "No more sees my sun as a Sanct-shape,         My moon as the Night-queen, My stars as august and sublime ones         That influences rain: "Reckons gross and ignoble my teaching,         Immoral my story, My love-lights a lure, that my species         May gather and gain. "'Give me,' he has said, 'but the matter          And means the gods lot her, My brain could evolve a creation         More seemly, more sane.' - "If ever a naughtiness seized me         To woo adulation From creatures more keen than those crude ones         That first formed my train - "If inly a moment I murmured,         'The simple praise sweetly, But sweetlier the sage'—and did rashly         Man's vision unrein, "I rue it! . . . His guileless forerunners,         Whose brains I could blandish, To measure the deeps of my mysteries         Applied them in vain. "From them my waste aimings and futile         I subtly could cover; 'Every best thing,' said they, 'to best purpose         Her powers preordain.' - "No more such! . . . My species are dwindling,         My forests grow barren, My popinjays fail from their tappings,         My larks from their strain. "My leopardine beauties are rarer,         My tusky ones vanish, My children have aped mine own slaughters         To quicken my wane. "Let me grow, then, but mildews and mandrakes,         And slimy distortions, Let nevermore things good and lovely         To me appertain; "For Reason is rank in my temples,         And Vision unruly, And chivalrous laud of my cunning         Is heard not again!"