The+Phantom+Horsewoman

**The Phantom Horsewoman**
"The Phantom Horsewoman" is among the poems commonly known as "ghost poems" because it focuses on a person obsessed with the deceased lover. In this poem, Hardy evokes pathetic sentiment of love for his lost wife, as contrasted with the other poems he had written in a calm descriptive tone. Written in 1912 just after death of his wife Emma, many scholars have argued that Hard was speaking to himself in third person about a vision of the young Emma he had courted before she died. Click on the annotated links to learn more.

Queer are the ways of a man I know: He comes and stands In a careworn craze, And looks at the sands In the seaward haze With moveless hands And face and gaze, Then turns to go… And what does he see when he gazes so?

They say he sees as an instant thing More clear than today, A sweet soft scene That once was in play By that briny green; Yes, notes alway Warm, real, and keen, What his back years bring- A phantom of his own figuring. Of this vision of his they might say more: Not only there

Does he see this sight, But everywhere In his brain-day, night, As if on the air It were drawn rose bright- Yea, far from that shore Does he carry this vision of heretofore:

A ghost-girl-rider. And though, toil-tried, He withers daily, Time touches her not, But she still rides gaily In his rapt thought On that shagged and shaly Atlantic spot, And as when first eyed Draws rein and sings to the swing of the tide.


 * Works Cited**

1. Johnson, Trevor. Acritical Introduction to the poems of Thomas Hardy. London:; Macmillan Education, 1991. 2. Thomas Hardy's Drawing of His Birthplace. [|http://www.victorianweb.org] online gallery; November 30 2007.

Created by Alex Mwale Contributor: Greg LaLuna

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