At a Bridal to - by Thomas Hardy

WHEN you paced forth, to wait maternity, / A dream of other offspring held my mind, / Compounded of us twain as Love designed; / Rare forms, that corporate now will never be!

Should I, too, wed as slave to Mode's decree, / And each thus found apart, of false desire, / A stolid line, whom no high aims will fire / As had fired ours could ever have mingled we;

And, grieved that lives so matched should mis-compose, / Each mourn the double waste; and question dare / To the Great Dame whence incarnation flows. / Why those high-purposed children never were: / What will she answer? That she does not care / If the race all such sovereign types unknows.