Thoughts of Phena at the News of Her Death
Thomas Hardy
1840 to 1928
Track 1
Reconstruct the poem by dragging each line into its correct position. Your goal is to reassemble the original poem as accurately as possible. As you move the lines, you'll see whether your arrangement is correct, helping you explore the poem's flow and meaning. You can also print out the jumbled poem to cut up and reassemble in the classroom. Either way, take your time, enjoy the process, and discover how the poet's words come together to create something truly beautiful.
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That no line of her writing have I,
To conceive my lost prize
And in vain do I urge my unsight
Thus I do but the phantom retain
I may picture her there.
And with laughter her eyes.
What scenes spread around her last days,
Nor a thread of her hair,
Did her gifts and compassions enray and enarch her sweet ways
Not a thread of her hair,
No mark of her late time as dame in her dwelling, whereby
With an aureate nimb?
It may be the more
Of the maiden of yore
Her full day-star; unease, or regret, or forebodings, or fears
As my relic; yet haply the best of her—fined in my brain
No mark of her late time as dame in her dwelling, whereby
Sad, shining, or dim?
I may picture her there;
Or did life-light decline from her years,
At her close, whom I knew when her dreams were upbrimming with light
Disennoble her soul?
And mischances control
Not a line of her writing have I