Thomas Hardy (1840–1928). Wessex Poems and Other Verses. 1898.
49. The Two Men
T
Wit, station, strength, and parentage;
They studied at the self-same schools,
And shaped their thoughts by common rules.
His hopes, his endings, and began
To rate the Market’s sordid war
As something scarce worth living for.
“I’ll further Truth and Purity;
Thereby to mend and mortal lot
And sweeten sorrow. Thrive I not,
Enough that I may lowly live,
And house my Love in some dim dell,
For pleasing them and theirs so well.”
In secret swift he labored on;
Such press of power had brought much gold
Applied to things of meaner mould.
To gather gains like other men;
Then thanked his God he’d traced his track
Too far for wish to drag him back.
To where his slighted garden lay;
Nettles and hemlock hid each lawn,
And every flower was starved and gone.
He rose, and sought his plighted one,
Resolved to loose her bond withal,
Lest she should perish in his fall.
As though he’d ceased to find her fair,
And said: “True love is dust to me;
I cannot kiss: I tire of thee!”
To put her sooner out of pain;
For incensed love breathes quick and dies,
When famished love a-lingering lies.)
It found no more the force it lost:
Hope was his only drink and food,
And hope extinct, decay ensued.
He had not kept a single friend;
He dwindled thin as phantoms be,
And drooped to death in poverty.…
To join the fortune-finding rout;
He liked the winnings of the mart,
But wearied of the working part.
Neglecting note of garb and hair,
And day by day reclined and thought
How he might live by doing nought.
To some. “But lend me of your bread,
And when the vast result looms nigh,
In profit you shall stand as I.”
Their kindness till they saw the gain;
And, since his substance now had run,
He rose to do what might be done.
And said: “My Love, I faint in fight:
Deserving as thou dost a crown,
My cares shall never drag thee down.”
Would hand her on much corn and wine,
And held her far in worth above
One who could only pray and love.)
To do the deed so blithely hailed;
He saw his projects wholly marred,
And gloom and want oppressed him hard;
Whereby he’d lost his every friend,
He perished in a pauper sty,
His mate the dying pauper nigh.
As “dust to dust” in burial read
Was echoed from each coffin-lid,
“These men were like in all they did.”