Explore "An Old Likeness" by Thomas Hardy on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
(RECALLING R. T.)
WHO would have thought / That, not having missed her / Talks, tears, laughter / In absence, or sought / To recall for so long / Her gamut of song; / Or ever to waft her / Signal of aught / That she, fancy-fanned, / Would well understand, / I should have kissed her / Picture when scanned / Yawning years after!
Yet, seeing her poor / Dim-outlined form / Chancewise at night-time, / Some old allure / Came on me, warm, / Fresh, pleadful, pure, / As in that bright time / At a far season / Of love and unreason, / And took me by storm / Here in this blight-time!
And thus it arose / That, yawning years after / Our early flows / Of wit and laughter, / And framing of rhymes / At idle times, / At sight of her painting, / Though she lies cold / In churchyard mould, / I took its feinting / As real, and kissed it, / As if I had wist it / Herself of old.