Thomas Hardy (2 June 1840 – 11 January 1928 / Dorchester / England)

Perhaps, long hence, when I have passed away,
Some other’s feature, accent, thought like mine,
Will carry you back to what I used to say,
And bring some memory of your love’s decline.

Then you may pause awhile and think, “Poor jade!”
And yield a sigh to me—as gift benign,
Not as the tittle of a debt unpaid
To one who could to you her all resign—

And thus reflecting, you will never see
That your thin thought, in two small words conveyed,
Was no such fleeting phantom-thought to me,
But the Whole Life wherein my part was played;
And you amid its fitful masquerade
A Thought—as I in yours but seem to be.