Poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins Part 10

The motion of that man's heart is fine Whom want could not make pine, pine That struggling should not sear him, a gift should cheer him Like that poor pocket of pence, poor pence of mine.

_62_

DENIS, whose motionable, alert, most vaulting wit Caps occasion with an intellectual fit.

Yet Arthur is a Bowman: his three-heeled timber'll hit The bald and bold blinking gold when all's done Right rooting in the bare b.u.t.t's wincing navel in the sight of the sun.

_63_

THE furl of fresh-leaved dogrose down His cheeks the forth-and-flaunting sun Had swarthed about with lion-brown Before the Spring was done.

His locks like all a ravel-rope's-end, With hempen strands in spray-- Fallow, foam-fallow, hanks--fall'n off their ranks, Swung down at a disarray.

Or like a juicy and jostling shock Of bluebells sheaved in May Or wind-long fleeces on the flock A day off shearing day.

Then over his turned temples--here-- Was a rose, or, failing that, Rough-Robin or five-lipped campion clear For a beauty-bow to his hat, And the sunlight sidled, like dewdrops, like dandled diamonds Through the sieve of the straw of the plait.

_64

The Woodlark_

_TEEVO cheetio cheevio chee:_ O where, what can that be?

_Weedio-weedio:_ there again!

So tiny a trickle of song-strain; And all round not to be found For brier, bough, furrow, or green ground Before or behind or far or at hand Either left either right Anywhere in the sunlight.

Well, after all! Ah but hark-- 'I am the little woodlark.

To-day the sky is two and two With white strokes and strains of the blue . . . . . . .

Round a ring, around a ring And while I sail (must listen) I sing . . . . . . .

The skylark is my cousin and he Is known to men more than me . . . . . . .

. . . when the cry within Says Go on then I go on Till the longing is less and the good gone

But down drop, if it says Stop, To the all-a-leaf of the treetop And after that off the bough . . . . . . .

I am so very, O so very glad That I do think there is not to be had . . .

The blue wheat-acre is underneath And the braided ear breaks out of the sheath, The ear in milk, lush the sash, And crush-silk poppies aflash, The blood-gush blade-gash Flame-rash rudred Bud sh.e.l.ling or broad-shed Tatter-ta.s.sel-tangled and dingle-a-dangled Dandy-hung dainty head.

And down ... the furrow dry Sunspurge and oxeye And laced-leaved lovely Foam-tuft fumitory . . . . . . .

Through the velvety wind V-winged To the nest's nook I balance and buoy With a sweet joy of a sweet joy, Sweet, of a sweet, of a sweet joy Of a sweet--a sweet--sweet--joy.'

_65 Moonrise_

I AWOKE in the Midsummer not to call night, in the white and the walk of the morning: The moon, dwindled and thinned to the fringe of a finger-nail held to the candle, Or paring of paradisacal fruit, lovely in waning but l.u.s.treless, Stepped from the stool, drew back from the barrow, of dark Maenefa the mountain; A cusp still clasped him, a fluke yet fanged him, en- tangled him, not quit utterly.

This was the prized, the desirable sight, unsought, pre- sented so easily, Parted me leaf and leaf, divided me, eyelid and eyelid of slumber.

_66_

REPEAT that, repeat, Cuckoo, bird, and open ear wells, heart-springs, delight- fully sweet, With a ballad, with a ballad, a rebound Off trundled timber and scoops of the hillside ground, hollow hollow hollow ground: The whole landscape flushes on a sudden at a sound.

_67 On a piece of music_

How all's to one thing wrought!

_See facsimile, after p. 92_.

(Transcriber's note: The facsimile of the handwritten poem is omitted from this text version. It is freely available online from the Internet Archive.)

_68_

'The child is father to the man.'

How can he be? The words are wild.

Suck any sense from that who can: 'The child is father to the man.'

No; what the poet did write ran, 'The man is father to the child.'

'The child is father to the man!'

How _can_ he be? The words are wild.

_69_

THE shepherd's brow fronting forked lightning, owns The horror and the havoc and the glory Of it. Angels fall, they are towers, from heaven--a story Of just, majestical, and giant groans.

But man--we, scaffold of score brittle bones; Who breathe, from groundlong babyhood to h.o.a.ry Age gasp; whose breath is our _memento mori_-- What ba.s.s is _our_ viol for tragic tones?

He! Hand to mouth he lives, and voids with shame; And, blazoned in however bold the name, Man Jack the man is, just; his mate a hussy.

And I that die these deaths, that feed this flame, That ... in smooth spoons spy life's masque mirrored: tame My tempests there, my fire and fever fussy.

_70 To his Watch_

MORTAL my mate, bearing my rock-a-heart Warm beat with cold beat company, shall I Earlier or you fail at our force, and lie The ruins of, rifled, once a world of art?

The telling time our task is; time's some part, Not all, but we were framed to fail and die-- One spell and well that one. There, ah thereby Is comfort's carol of all or woe's worst smart.

Field-flown the departed day no morning brings Saying 'This was yours' with her, but new one, worse.

And then that last and shortest . . .

_71_

STRIKE, churl; hurl, cheerless wind, then; heltering hail May's beauty ma.s.sacre and wisped wild clouds grow Out on the giant air; tell Summer No, Bid joy back, have at the harvest, keep Hope pale.

_72 Epithalamion_