Monday 30 October 2017

The Fiddler, Thomas Hardy; Thomas Hardy's Violin



The Fiddler


The fiddler knows what's brewing
        To the lilt of his lyric wiles:
The fiddler knows what rueing
        Will come of this night's smiles!

He sees couples join them for dancing,
        And afterwards joining for life,
He sees them pay high for their prancing
        By a welter of wedded strife.

He twangs: ‘Music hails from the devil,
        Though vaunted to come from heaven,
For it makes people do at a revel
        What multiplies sins by seven.

‘There's many a heart now mangled,
        And waiting its time to go,
Whose tendrils were first entangled
        By my sweet viol and bow!’



Thomas Hardy


The Casterbridge Band

Oyster Girl

Oyster Girl (2)

Bob the Fiddler, William Barnes

To my Father's Violin, Thomas Hardy



At The Railway Station, Upway



'There is not much that I can do,
    For I've no money that's quite my own!'
    Spoke up the pitying child--
A little boy with a violin
At the station before the train came in,--
'But I can play my fiddle to you,
And a nice one 'tis, and good in tone!'

    The man in the handcuffs smiled;
The constable looked, and he smiled, too,
    As the fiddle began to twang;
And the man in the handcuffs suddenly sang
           With grimful glee:
           'This life so free
           Is the thing for me!'
And the constable smiled, and said no word,
As if unconscious of what he heard;
And so they went on till the train came in--
The convict, and boy with the violin.


Thomas Hardy







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