Edward Thomas
 

Another Thomas, this time Edward. I've read a few poems by him before but otherwise don't know his work very well. Here's a poem by him that seems simple but might be interesting to discuss or analyse:

The Unknown
by Edward Thomas


She is most fair,
And when they see her pass
The poets' ladies
Look no more in the glass
But after her.

On a bleak moor
Running under the moon
She lures a poet,
Once proud or happy, soon
Far from his door.

Beside a train,
Because they saw her go,
Or failed to see her,
Travellers and watchers know
Another pain.

The simple lack
Of her is more to me
Than others' presence
Whether life splendid be
Or utter black.

I have not seen,
I have no news of her;
I can tell only
She is not here, but there
She might have been.

She is to be kissed
Only perhaps by me;
She may be seeking
Me and no other; she
may not exist.
.

Petra

Be careful. Posting poems by good poets here is frowned on in some circles. On the other hand it might catch on...

Why oh why did he not say "she's" in the last stanza to preserve the syllabics?

Many formalists seem to baulk at pure syllabics. I find them easy to tune into.

Lovely

Philip

Philip: I haven't analysed the poem myself, but off hand I find a pattern of two-beat lines alternating with three-beat lines. I hadn't thought of it as syllabics, but maybe it is.

What do you think of this enjambment; isn't it right up your alley?

She is not here, but there
She might have been.

The main question is: who is "she"? At the start of the poem, I got the feeling it could be a poet's muse, and later it looked like it could be an ideal, but neither seems to fit the poem overall.

I love Edward Thomas and I think he is too little known. He wrote a wonderful poem about the Great War which I don't have by me, but I never forgot these lines:

"Now on the road to France,
heavy is the tread
of the living, but the dead
returning lightly dance."

This haunts me & sometimes I say it over and over.

I love Edward Thomas. Thanks for starting this thread, Petra.

The poem is full of surprises, drawing on some stock imagery but keeping you guessing.

Seems to me that the woman is an anima ideal, similar to the Muse but not necessarily having to do only with poetry or art.

For those who don't know him, here's his greatest hit:


ADLESTROP

Yes, I remember Adlestrop –
The name because one afternoon
Of heat the express-train drew up there
Unwontendly. It was late June.

The steam hissed. Someone cleared his throat.
No one left and no one came
On the bare platform. What I saw
Was Adlestrop – only the name

And willows, willow-herb, and grass,
And meadowsweet, and haycocks dry,
No whit less still and lonely fair
Than the high cloudlets in the sky.

And for that minute a blackbird sang
Close by, and round him, mistier,
Farther and farther, all the birds
Of Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire.

Thanks for your take on the poem, Andrew!

"Adlestrop" is beautiful, Holly. Thanks for it.

And thanks for the lines from another Thomas poem, Gail. I looked them up and they come from his poem "Roads".

Thomas seems to have a number of poems with war themes/images, and in fact he was killed while fighting in WWI. Otherwise his poems seem very much anchored in the English countryside. In my copy of The Rattle Bag he's represented by eight poems; Heaney & Hughes must have really liked him. Here's my favorite Thomas poem from that anthology:


Cock-Crow

Out of the wood of thoughts that grows by night
To be cut down by the sharp axe of light, –
Out of the night, two cocks together crow,
Cleaving the darkness with a silver blow:
And bright before my eyes twin trumpeters stand,
Heralds of splendour, one at either hand,
Each facing each as in a coat of arms: –
The milkers lace their boots up at the farms.
.

Clive Watkins had a series of threads on Thomas a couple years ago, including Clive's own very interesting commentary on some of the poems:

http://www.ablemuse.com/erato/showthread.php?t=748

http://www.ablemuse.com/erato/showthread.php?t=750

http://www.ablemuse.com/erato/showthread.php?t=753

Regarding "The Unknown"…

Like Petra, I read the poem as falling into a 2-3-2-3-2 stress pattern, but the consistency of the syllable counts is notable, 4-6-5-6-4, the one exception being the line Philip points out (if an elision is allowed in line 14). In particular, the extra syllable in the middle dimeter line seems to have a deliberate rhythmic effect, giving a feminine ending to the one line that doesn't rhyme. Very "crafty."

As to who "she" is, maybe the title is the best answer. She is that which, grasped, would lose all value.

Thanks for the thread links, AE. I looked briefly at them and found a lot of poems, info and insights. I intend to read them all later.
I like your take on "she".

Issue 22 (Summer 2008) of Gerry Cambridge’s fine periodical, The Dark Horse, includes an essay of mine on Edward Thomas entitled “The Elusive Presence of Edward Thomas” in which I sought to place him in his historical context and to show something of his range and skill as a poet. The origin of the essay was Gerry’s having seen my posts on Thomas here at Eratosphere as linked to by AE above.

Clive Watkins