Neutral Tones - Thomas Hardy poem reading | Jordan Harling Reads

Poetry reading of Neutral Tones by Thomas Hardy.

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Full poem text, public domain (also available in subtitles):

We stood by a pond that winter day,
And the sun was white, as though chidden of God,
And a few leaves lay on the starving sod;
– They had fallen from an ash, and were gray.

Your eyes on me were as eyes that rove
Over tedious riddles of years ago;
And some words played between us to and fro
On which lost the more by our love.

The smile on your mouth was the deadest thing
Alive enough to have strength to die;
And a grin of bitterness swept thereby
Like an ominous bird a-wing….

Since then, keen lessons that love deceives,
And wrings with wrong, have shaped to me
Your face, and the God curst sun, and a tree,
And a pond edged with grayish leaves.

Neutral Tones, written by Thomas Hardy. Narrated by Jordan Harling.

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By Bain News Service, publisher [Public domain, Public domain or Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

[gardensofthegods]

Jordan Harling Reads .. thank you for this upload of Thomas Hardy's NEUTRAL TONES .
The poem first struck a chord very deeply in me when I was a kid .
Little did I know back then why it would be so significant for me many times in my life .
And each time I think about this poem, I can still see vividly what I was picturing in my mind upon first hearing it .