His Country
By Thomas Hardy
[He travels southward, and looks around;]
I journeyed from my native spot
Across the south sea shine,
And found that people in hall and cot
Laboured and suffered each his lot
Even as I did mine.
[and cannot discern the boundary]
Thus noting them in meads and marts
It did not seem to me
That my dear country with its hearts,
Minds, yearnings, worse and better parts
Had ended with the sea.
[of his native country;]
I further and further went anon,
As such I still surveyed,
And further yet - yea, on and on,
And all the men I looked upon
Had heart-strings fellow-made.
[or where his duties to his fellow-creatures end;]
I traced the whole terrestrial round,
Homing the other side;
Then said I, "What is there to bound
My denizenship? It seems I have found
Its scope to be world-wide."
[nor who are his enemies]
I asked me: "Whom have I to fight,
And whom have I to dare,
And whom to weaken, crush, and blight?
My country seems to have kept in sight
On my way everywhere."
1913.