What is the overall tone of this poem?

hap
by thomas hardy

if but some vengeful god would call to me
from up the sky, and laugh: “thou suffering thing,
know that thy sorrow is my ecstasy,
that thy love’s loss is my hate’s profiting! ”
then would i bear, and clench myself, and die,
steeled by the sense of ire unmerited;
half-eased, too, that a powerfuller than i
had willed and meted me the tears i shed.

but not so. how arrives it joy lies slain,
and why unblooms the best hope ever sown?
—crass casualty obstructs the sun and rain,
and dicing time for gladness casts a moan….
these purblind doomsters had as readily strown
blisses about my pilgrimage as pain.

a) reflective
b) fierce
c) pessimistic
d) vengeful

2b2t

explanation:

2b2t

a question like this requires the excerpt to be included in order to answer the question.

1.   in sonnet 18, the speaker wants to describe the beauty of his love, but can’t find the words to do so. the speaker says “then in mid-utterance the lay was lost” when he tries to think of the words to describe his love’s beauty.   through his defeat of finding words to describe his love, he shows his love for her.

2.   instead of describing how perfect his love is or comparing her to other beautiful things, he says she is average and there is nothing special about her.   at the last 2 lines of the poem, the volta changes the poem by saying that even though his love is average in beauty, his love for her is special and unique. so instead of praising her throughout the whole poem, he contrasts her average characteristics with his special love for her.

3.   the beloved asked the speaker to describe how he feels about her. she begins to describe what she feels but "drop the torch" and says that she can't do it because the words "hid in me out of reach." the the speaker says "nay, let the silence of my womanhood command my woman-love to thy belief" and that her silence will have to be the answer to his question.