Explore "The Maid of Keinton Mandeville" by Thomas Hardy on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
(A TRIBUTE TO SIR H. BISHOP)
I HEAR that maiden still / Of Keinton Mandeville / Singing, in flights that played / As wind-wafts through us all, / Till they made our mood a thrall / To their aery rise and fall, / "Should he upbraid."
Rose-necked, in sky-gray gown, / From a stage in Stower Town / Did she sing, and singing smile / As she blent that dexterous voice / With the ditty of her choice, / And banished our annoys / Thereawhile.
One with such song had power / To wing the heaviest hour / Of him who housed with her. / Who did I never knew / When her spoused estate ondrew, / And her warble flung its woo / In his ear.
Ah, she's a beldame now, / Time-trenched on cheek and brow, / Whom I once heard as a maid / From Keinton Mandeville / Of matchless scope and skill / Sing, with smile and swell and trill, / "Should he upbraid! "