Gerard Manley Hopkins: God’s Grandeur
August 13, 2009
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, at the brown brink eastward, springs—
Because the Holy Ghost over the bent
World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.
And though the last lights off the black West went
Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs—
Because the Holy Ghost over the bent
World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.
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Notice how the concluding sestet starts out not with “But in spite of all of this…”, but instead with “And for all of this…” That makes a world of difference.
Hopkins had such a deep and sensitive understanding of God’s familiar, committed and superabundant love for his frail creatures, human beings.
Did you know there was an industrial-rock adaptation of this poem? It’s done by Mortal. I only now realized it was a Hopkins poem!
The lyrics of the Mortal song go:
The world is charged with the Grandeur of God
The world is charged with beauty
It will flame out, like shining from Shook foil;
It gathers to a greatness, like the Ooze of oil
Crushed
Because the Holy Ghost over the bend World
Broods with warm breast and with Ah!
Bright Wings
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, at the brown brink east-Ward, springs
Because the Holy Ghost over the bend World
Broods with warm breast and with Ah!
Bright Wings
That’s cool. I’d like to hear it sometime.
It’s on an old CD, one I got it in the early 90s; I was looking to see if something was done using it, like a video on youtube, but I can’t find it. I know there are mp3s of it for sale (the song alone) on the net, but I don’t know where is legitimate for that.