poem

The Glory — Jul 13, 2026

Edward Thomas

0 votes
◆

THE glory of the beauty of the morning,--
The cuckoo crying over the untouched dew;
The blackbird that has found it, and the dove
That tempts me on to something sweeter than love;
White clouds ranged even and fair as new-mown hay;
The heat, the stir, the sublime vacancy
Of sky and meadow and forest and my own heart:--
The glory invites me, yet it leaves me scorning
All I can ever do, all I can be,
Beside the lovely of motion, shape, and hue,
The happiness I fancy fit to dwell
In beauty's presence. Shall I now this day
Begin to seek as far as heaven, as hell,
Wisdom or strength to match this beauty, start
And tread the pale dust pitted with small dark drops,
In hope to find whatever it is I seek,
Hearkening to short-lived happy-seeming things
That we know naught of, in the hazel copse?
Or must I be content with discontent
As larks and swallows are perhaps with wings?
And shall I ask at the day's end once more
What beauty is, and what I can have meant
By happiness? And shall I let all go,
Glad, weary, or both? Or shall I perhaps know
That I was happy oft and oft before,
Awhile forgetting how I am fast pent,
How dreary-swift, with naught to travel to,
Is Time? I cannot bite the day to the core.

◆

Comments

  1. Loading comments…
📖 About this poem

This poem catches Edward Thomas mid-morning, ambushed by his own senses. The world offers itself lavishly, cuckoo, blackbird, dove, clouds like new-mown hay, and instead of simple delight he feels the old ache: how do you match a beauty that asks nothing of you but leaves you wanting to be equal to it? The music here is restless rather than musical in the songbird sense, long unspooling sentences full of questions, as if thought itself can't settle, mirroring the mind circling a feeling it can't quite hold. The closing image says it best: "I cannot bite the day to the core." Beauty, like fruit, resists being fully possessed. That's the poem's lasting nerve, it doesn't pretend nature answers our loneliness. It just makes the loneliness feel briefly, gloriously accompanied, which is often the most honest comfort a beautiful morning can offer.

⚠ Sandbox · not production