“I Travel As A Phantom Now” Thomas Hardy

I travel as a phantom now,
For people do not wish to see
In flesh and blood so bare a bough
        As Nature makes of me.

And thus I visit bodiless
Strange gloomy households often at odds,
And wonder if Man's consciousness
        Was a mistake of God's.

And next I meet you, and I pause,
And think that if mistake it were,
As some have said, O then it was
        One that I well can bear!

1915.