A Wife in London
December 1899
I
She sits in the tawny vapour
That the Thames-side lanes have uprolled,
Behind whose webby fold-on-fold
Like a waning taper
The street-lamp glimmers cold.
A messenger’s knock cracks smartly,
Flashed news in her hand
Of meaning it dazes to understand
Though shaped so shortly:
He–he has fallen–in the far South Land…
II
‘Tis the morrow; the fog hangs thicker,
The postman nears and goes:
A letter is brought whose lines disclose
By the firelight flicker
His hand, whom the worm now knows:
Fresh–firm–peed in highest feather–
Page-full of his hoped return,
And of home-plaed jaunts of brake and bu
In the summer weather,
And of new love that they would learn.
Thomas Hardy
