{
 "id": "edward-thomas/roads",
 "title": "Roads",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "Edward Thomas",
 "poet_slug": "edward-thomas",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Last Poems",
 "book_slug": "last-poems",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 54,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1918,
  "venue": "Last Poems (1918)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/22732"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/edward-thomas_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/22423",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/22732",
   "https://www.google.com/books/edition/Collected_Poems/LMsEAQAAIAAJ",
   "https://www.google.com/books/edition/Two_Poems/3ycPAAAAQAAJ"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 64,
  "n_stanzas": 16,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 34,
  "max_indent": 0
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "I love roads:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The goddesses that dwell",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Far along invisible",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Are my favourite gods.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Roads go on",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "While we forget, and are",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Forgotten like a star",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That shoots and is gone.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "On this earth ’tis sure",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We men have not made",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Anything that doth fade",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "So soon, so long endure:",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "The hill road wet with rain",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In the sun would not gleam",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Like a winding stream",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "If we trod it not again.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "They are lonely",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "While we sleep, lonelier",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For lack of the traveller",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Who is now a dream only.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "From dawn’s twilight",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And all the clouds like sheep",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "On the mountains of sleep",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "They wind into the night.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "The next turn may reveal",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Heaven: upon the crest",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The close pine clump, at rest",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And black, may Hell conceal.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Often footsore, never",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Yet of the road I weary,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Though long and steep and dreary",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As it winds on for ever.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Helen of the roads,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The mountain ways of Wales",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And the Mabinogion tales,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Is one of the true gods,",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Abiding in the trees,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The threes and fours so wise,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The larger companies,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That by the roadside be,",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "And beneath the rafter",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Else uninhabited",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Excepting by the dead;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And it is her laughter",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "At morn and night I hear",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "When the thrush cock sings",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Bright irrelevant things,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And when the chanticleer",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Calls back to their own night",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Troops that make loneliness",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With their light footsteps’ press,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As Helen’s own are light.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Now all roads lead to France",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And heavy is the tread",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of the living; but the dead",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Returning lightly dance:",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Whatever the road bring",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To me or take from me,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "They keep me company",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With their pattering,",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Crowding the solitude",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of the loops over the downs,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Hushing the roar of towns",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And their brief multitude.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}