Ah, are you digging on my grave?

The State Board of Education in Texas has adopted a plethora of new books this year (after deciding to go with revisionist history, rather than actual events, but that's neither here nor there) so everyone at Learning Ally (formerly RFB&D) is slogging through these new texts so as to have recordings ready for the start of the school year.

Today I was working on about page 950 or so of a 1,400 page book (I pity the poor tykes that will have to lug these home and back) in a section of British Poetry. The featured author was Thomas Hardy, and the poem was "Ah, are you digging on my grave?" - written about the turn of the century after the death of his estranged (for many years) wife. Perhaps that should have been a clue. The poem is a set of questions by the deceased herself, about who it is that is disturbing her grave. Each question is answered, beginning at the "--". It begins:

"Ah, are you digging on my grave,
My loved one? -- planting rue?"

-- "No: yesterday he went to wed
One of the brightest wealth has bred.
'It cannot hurt her now,' he said,
'That I should not be true.'"

"Then who is digging on my grave,
My nearest dearest kin?"

-- "Ah, no: they sit and think, 'What use!
What good will planting flowers produce?
No tendance of her mound can loose
Her spirit from Death's gin.'"

"But someone digs upon my grave?
My enemy? -- prodding sly?"

-- "Nay: when she heard you had passed the Gate
That shuts on all flesh soon or late,
She thought you no more worth her hate,
And cares not where you lie.

"Then, who is digging on my grave?
Say -- since I have not guessed!"

-- "O it is I, my mistress dear,
Your little dog, who still lives near,
And much I hope my movements here
Have not disturbed your rest?"

And at this point, I choked up, thinking about the faithful little dog, there at the mistresses' grave. The directors I work with on a regular basis are used to this behavior on my part, but I had someone new and a trainee, so they were rather alarmed until I  gathered myself and said not to worry, it happens all the time. And then I went on reading.

"Ah yes! You dig upon my grave...
Why flashed it not to me
That one true heart was left behind!
What feeling do we ever find
To equal among human kind
A dog's fidelity!"

But get this!

"Mistress, I dug upon your grave
To bury a bone, in case
I should be hungry near this spot
When passing on my daily trot.
I am sorry, but I quite forgot
It was your resting place."

And at this point I just lost it! Here I am feeling so sad about the faithful little dog, and the &%*# mutt is just trying to bury a bone!

Moral: you can never trust a British Poet!