Morning Meadow
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
Gerard Manley Hopkins had a very troubled life, struggling with ill health and depression as well as the backlash of his conversion to Roman Catholocism from the Anglican faith of his parents. Sadly he was unable to reconcile his desire to be a poet with what he considered to be his religious obligations as a Jesuit priet. His poems were never published before his death, and we only have them because a few of friends appreciated them enough to make sure they were not forgotten. Despite a life of inner pain he never lost his faith in the ultimate goodness of God, as is apparant from the poem above which ends on a note of real hope.
Through its biblical imagery, the poem manages to conjure up, at various points, images of the Creation, the Fall, Christ’s Agony and Crucifixion, man’s continuing sinfulness and rebellion, and the continuing presence and quiet work of the Holy Spirit. These images combine to assure the reader that although the world may look bleak, man may yet hope, because God, through the sacrifice of Christ and the descent of His Holy Spirit, has overcome the world. Read more.
