Time & Brevity

This Summer and Last

by Thomas Hardy 1840–1928

From Human Shows, Far Phantasies, Songs and Trifles (1925)

Time & Brevity

Unhappy summer you,
Who do not see
What your yester-summer saw!
Never, never will you be
Its match to me,
Never, never draw
Smiles your forerunner drew,
Know what it knew!

Divine things done and said
Illumined it,
Whose rays crept into corn-brown curls.
Whose breezes heard a humorous wit
Of fancy flit. —
Still the alert brook purls,
Though feet that there would tread
Elsewhere have sped.

So, bran-new summer, you
Will never see
All that yester-summer saw!
Never, never will you be
In memory
Its rival, never draw
Smiles your forerunner drew,
Know what it knew!

MLA

Hardy, Thomas. “This Summer and Last.” Poetry Codex, poetrycodex.com/poem/hardy/655/.

Chicago

Hardy, Thomas. “This Summer and Last.” Poetry Codex. https://poetrycodex.com/poem/hardy/655/.

Read this poem with the Codex →

More by Thomas Hardy