Monday, October 25, 2010

Pied Beauty (Redux)


Always nice to repeat some of Hopkins work:

Glory be to God for dappled things,For skies of couple-color as a brindled cow,
For rose-moles in stipple** upon trout that swim.Fresh-firecoal chestnut falls***, finches' wings;
Landscape plotted and pieced---fold, fallow, and plough;

And all trades, their gear and tackle and trim.All things counter, spare, original, strange;
Whatever is fickle, freckled, (who knows how?)
With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim;
He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change:
Praise Him.

---Gerard Manley Hopkins, 1877

*Pied: Having patches of more than one color; i.e. the "Pied Piper"
**Rose-colored dots or flecks
***Fallen chestnuts, red as burning coals



 

2 comments:

David C Brown said...

This fine poem is the Hopkins one that sticks in my mind most; I'm fond of the poetry of George Mackay Brown who also studied Hopkins.

C. Marie Byars said...

Thanks for coming back again. I plan to have this read at my funeral someday... which, unless something unforeseen happens, will not be for many years. I wrote my master's thesis (MA in theology) on Hopkins' work. I'll need to look more into George Mackay Brown. Thanks!