Tuesday, October 20, 2009

There lives the dearest freshness deep down things . . .


The world is charged with the grandeur of God.
It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;
It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil
Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod?
Generations have trod, have trod, have trod;
And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;
And wears man's smudge and shares man's smell: the soil
Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.


And for all this, nature is never spent;
There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;
And though the last lights off the black West went
Oh, morning, and the brown brink eastward, springs--
Because the Holy Ghost over the bent
World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.

----Gerard Manley Hopkins

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Marsha, love your blog, love that Gerard Manly Hopkins poem. He was a Jesuit! Of course you may put my faith blog on face book--go for it! I actually left a comment and link about it on Fr. James Martin's facebook (he wrote, "My Life with the Saints," which I adore.