Mismet

Thomas Hardy 1840 (Stinsford) – 1928 (Dorchester, Dorset)



He was leaning by a face,
He was looking into eyes,
And he knew a trysting-place,
And he heard seductive sighs;
But the face,
And the eyes,
And the place,
And the sighs,
Were not, alas, the right ones--the ones meet for him--
Though fine and sweet the features, and the feelings all abrim.

II
She was looking at a form,
She was listening for a tread,
She could feel a waft of charm
When a certain name was said;
But the form,
And the tread,
And the charm,
And name said,
Were the wrong ones for her, and ever would be so,
While the heritor of the right it would have saved her soul to know!

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 14, 2023

35 sec read
141

Quick analysis:

Scheme ABABABABCC XDEFEDEFEGG
Closest metre Iambic trimeter
Characters 596
Words 119
Stanzas 2
Stanza Lengths 10, 11

Thomas Hardy

Thomas Hardy, was not a Scottish Minister, not a Moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland nor a Professor of Eccesiastical History at Edinburgh University. more…

All Thomas Hardy poems | Thomas Hardy Books

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    "Mismet" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 19 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem/36431/mismet>.

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