The Path

Edward Thomas 1878 (London Borough of Lambeth) – 1917 (Pas-de-Calais)



RUNNING along a bank, a parapet
That saves from the precipitous wood below
The level road, there is a path. It serves
Children for looking down the long smooth steep,
Between the legs of beech and yew, to where
A fallen tree checks the sight: while men and women
Content themselves with the road and what they see
Over the bank, and what the children tell.
The path, winding like silver, trickles on,
Bordered and even invaded by thinnest moss
That tries to cover roots and crumbling chalk
With gold, olive, and emerald, but in vain.
The children wear it. They have flattened the bank
On top, and silvered it between the moss
With the current of their feet, year after year.
But the road is houseless, and leads not to school.
To see a child is rare there, and the eye
Has but the road, the wood that overhangs
And underyawns it, and the path that looks
As if it led on to some legendary
Or fancied place where men have wished to go
And stay; till, sudden, it ends where the wood ends.

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on May 02, 2023

56 sec read
122

Quick analysis:

Scheme ABCDEFGHIJKLMJNOPQRGBS
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 993
Words 187
Stanzas 1
Stanza Lengths 22

Edward Thomas

Philip Edward Thomas was an Anglo-Welsh poet and essayist. more…

All Edward Thomas poems | Edward Thomas Books

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