diff options
| author | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 01:49:05 -0700 |
|---|---|---|
| committer | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 01:49:05 -0700 |
| commit | 67ced02cf8a4f10d4c34fc440359615089f4480a (patch) | |
| tree | 6481715a6880754bab84e582134927bd34f9c241 | |
| -rw-r--r-- | .gitattributes | 3 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 22403-8.txt | 4821 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 22403-8.zip | bin | 0 -> 80759 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 22403.txt | 4821 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 22403.zip | bin | 0 -> 80356 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | LICENSE.txt | 11 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | README.md | 2 |
7 files changed, 9658 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/22403-8.txt b/22403-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..fd1e2c5 --- /dev/null +++ b/22403-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,4821 @@ +Project Gutenberg's Poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins, by Gerard Manley Hopkins + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins + Now First Published + +Author: Gerard Manley Hopkins + +Editor: Robert Bridges + +Release Date: August 26, 2007 [EBook #22403] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK POEMS OF GERARD MANLEY HOPKINS *** + + + + +Produced by Lewis Jones + + + + + +Hopkins, Gerard Manley (1918) "Poems" + + + +_Poems_ + +of + +Gerard Manley Hopkins + +now first published + +Edited with notes + +by + +ROBERT BRIDGES + +Poet Laureate + + +LONDON + +HUMPHREY MILFORD + + + +_CATHARINAE_ + +HVNC LIBRVM + +QVI FILA EIVS CARISSIMI + +POETAE DEBITAM INGENIO LAVDEM EXPECTANTIS + +SERVM TAMEN MONVMENTVM ESSET + +ANNVM AETATIS XCVIII AGENTI + +VETERIS AMICITIAE PIGNVS + +D D D + +_R B_ + + + +Transcriber's notes: The poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins contain +unconventional English, accents and horizontal lines. Facsimile +images of the poems as originally published are freely available +online from the Internet Archive. Please use these images to +check for any errors or inadequacies in this electronic text. + +The editor's endnotes refer to the page numbers of the +Author's _Preface_ and to the first page of the _Early Poems_. +I have therefore inserted these page numbers in round brackets: +(1), (2), etc. up to (7). For pages 1 to 7 the line numbers in +this electronic version are the same as those referred to in the +editor's endnotes. + +After page 7 this text mainly follows the editor's endnotes +which, apart from the occasional page reference, refer to the +poems by their numbers. For example: + +5. PENMAEN POOL. + +In poem _26_ I have retained the larger than normal spacing +between the first and second words of the eighth line. + +In poem _36_ I have rendered the first word of line 28 as "Óne." +In the original the accent falls on the second letter but I did +not have a text character to record this accurately. + +The editor's notes contain one word and, later, one phrase from +the ancient Greek; these are retained but the Greek letters have +been Englished. + + + +CONTENTS + +Author's Preface +Early Poems +Poems 1876-1889 +Unfinished Poems & Fragments + + +EDITORIAL + +Preface to Notes +Notes + + +OUR generation already is overpast, +And thy lov'd legacy, Gerard, hath lain +Coy in my home; as once thy heart was fain +Of shelter, when God's terror held thee fast +In life's wild wood at Beauty and Sorrow aghast; +Thy sainted sense tramme'd in ghostly pain, +Thy rare ill-broker'd talent in disdain: +Yet love of Christ will win man's love at last. + + Hell wars without; but, dear, the while my hands +Gather'd thy book, I heard, this wintry day, +Thy spirit thank me, in his young delight +Stepping again upon the yellow sands. + Go forth: amidst our chaffinch flock display +Thy plumage of far wonder and heavenward flight! + +Chilswell, Jan. 1918. + + +(1) AUTHOR'S PREFACE + +THE poems in this book* (*That is, the MS. +described in Editor's preface as B. This +preface does not apply to the early poems.) +are written some in Running Rhythm, the common +rhythm in English use, some in Sprung Rhythm, +and some in a mixture of the two. And those in +the common rhythm are some counterpointed, +some not. + +Common English rhythm, called Running Rhythm +above, is measured by feet of either two or three +syllables and (putting aside the imperfect feet at the +beginning and end of lines and also some unusual +measures, in which feet seem to be paired together and +double or composite feet to arise) never more or less. + +Every foot has one principal stress or accent, and +this or the syllable it falls on may be called the Stress +of the foot and the other part, the one or two unaccented +syllables, the Slack. Feet (and the rhythms made out +of them) in which the stress comes first are called +Falling Feet and Falling Rhythms, feet and rhythm +in which the slack comes first are called Rising Feet +and Rhythms, and if the stress is between two slacks +there will be Rocking Feet and Rhythms. These +distinctions are real and true to nature; but for purposes +of scanning it is a great convenience to follow the +(2) example of music and take the stress always first, as +the accent or the chief accent always comes first in +a musical bar. If this is done there will be in common +English verse only two possible feet--the so-called +accentual Trochee and Dactyl, and correspondingly +only two possible uniform rhythms, the so-called +Trochaic and Dactylic. But they may be mixed and then +what the Greeks called a Logaoedic Rhythm arises. +These are the facts and according to these the scanning +of ordinary regularly-written English verse is very +simple indeed and to bring in other principles is here +unnecessary. + +But because verse written strictly in these feet and +by these principles will become same and tame the +poets have brought in licences and departures from +rule to give variety, and especially when the natural +rhythm is rising, as in the common ten-syllable or +five-foot verse, rhymed or blank. These irregularities +are chiefly Reversed Feet and Reversed or Counterpoint +Rhythm, which two things are two steps or degrees +of licence in the same kind. By a reversed foot +I mean the putting the stress where, to judge by +the rest of the measure, the slack should be and the +slack where the stress, and this is done freely at the +beginning of a line and, in the course of a line, after +a pause; only scarcely ever in the second foot or +place and never in the last, unless when the poet +designs some extraordinary effect; for these places are +characteristic and sensitive and cannot well be touched. +But the reversal of the first foot and of some middle +(3) foot after a strong pause is a thing so natural that +our poets have generally done it, from Chaucer down, +without remark and it commonly passes unnoticed and +cannot be said to amount to a formal change of rhythm, +but rather is that irregularity which all natural growth +and motion shews. If however the reversal is repeated +in two feet running, especially so as to include the +sensitive second foot, it must be due either to great +want of ear or else is a calculated effect, the super- +inducing or mounting of a new rhythm upon the old; +and since the new or mounted rhythm is actually heard +and at the same time the mind naturally supplies the +natural or standard foregoing rhythm, for we do not +forget what the rhythm is that by rights we should be +hearing, two rhythms are in some manner running at +once and we have something answerable to counter- +point in music, which is two or more strains of tune +going on together, and this is Counterpoint Rhythm. +Of this kind of verse Milton is the great master and +the choruses of _Samson Agonistes_ are written throughout +in it--but with the disadvantage that he does not let +the reader clearly know what the ground-rhythm is +meant to be and so they have struck most readers as +merely irregular. And in fact if you counterpoint +throughout, since one only of the counter rhythms is +actually heard, the other is really destroyed or cannot +come to exist, and what is written is one rhythm only +and probably Sprung Rhythm, of which I now speak. + +Sprung Rhythm, as used in this book, is measured +by feet of from one to four syllables, regularly, and for +(4) particular effects any number of weak or slack syllables +may be used. It has one stress, which falls on the +only syllable, if there is only one, or, if there are more, +then scanning as above, on the first, and so gives rise to +four sorts of feet, a monosyllable and the so-called +accentual Trochee, Dactyl, and the First Paeon. And +there will be four corresponding natural rhythms; but +nominally the feet are mixed and any one may follow +any other. And hence Sprung Rhythm differs from +Running Rhythm in having or being only one nominal +rhythm, a mixed or 'logaoedic' one, instead of three, +but on the other hand in having twice the flexibility of +foot, so that any two stresses may either follow one +another running or be divided by one, two, or three +slack syllables. But strict Sprung Rhythm cannot be +counterpointed. In Sprung Rhythm, as in logaoedic +rhythm generally, the feet are assumed to be equally +long or strong and their seeming inequality is made up +by pause or stressing. + +Remark also that it is natural in Sprung Rhythm for +the lines to be _rove over_, that is for the scanning of +each line immediately to take up that of the one before, +so that if the first has one or more syllables at its end +the other must have so many the less at its beginning; +and in fact the scanning runs on without break from +the beginning, say, of a stanza to the end and all the +stanza is one long strain, though written in lines asunder. + +Two licences are natural to Sprung Rhythm. The +one is rests, as in music; but of this an example is +scarcely to be found in this book, unless in the _Echos_, +(5) second line. The other is _hangers_ or _outrides_ that +is one, two, or three slack syllables added to a foot and +not counting in the nominal scanning. They are so +called because they seem to hang below the line or +ride forward or backward from it in another dimension +than the line itself, according to a principle needless to +explain here. These outriding half feet or hangers are +marked by a loop underneath them, and plenty of them +will be found. + +The other marks are easily understood, namely +accents, where the reader might be in doubt which +syllable should have the stress; slurs, that is loops +_over_ syllables, to tie them together into the time of +one; little loops at the end of a line to shew that the +rhyme goes on to the first letter of the next line; +what in music are called pauses, to shew that the +syllable should be dwelt on; and twirls, to mark +reversed or counterpointed rhythm. + +Note on the nature and history of Sprung Rhythm-- +Sprung Rhythm is the most natural of things. For +(1) it is the rhythm of common speech and of written +prose, when rhythm is perceived in them. (2) It is the +rhythm of all but the most monotonously regular music, +so that in the words of choruses and refrains and in +songs written closely to music it arises. (3) It is +found in nursery rhymes, weather saws, and so on; +because, however these may have been once made in +running rhythm, the terminations having dropped off by +the change of language, the stresses come together and +so the rhythm is sprung. (4) It arises in common +(6) verse when reversed or counterpointed, for the same +reason. + +But nevertheless in spite of all this and though Greek +and Latin lyric verse, which is well known, and the old +English verse seen in _Pierce Ploughman_ are in sprung +rhythm, it has in fact ceased to be used since the +Elizabethan age, Greene being the last writer who can +be said to have recognised it. For perhaps there was +not, down to our days, a single, even short, poem in +English in which sprung rhythm is employed not for +single effects or in fixed places but as the governing +principle of the scansion. I say this because the +contrary has been asserted: if it is otherwise the poem +should be cited. + + +Some of the sonnets in this book* (*See previous note.) +are in five-foot, some in six-foot or Alexandrine lines. + +Nos. 13 and 22 are Curtal-Sonnets, that is they are +constructed in proportions resembling those of the +sonnet proper, namely 6 + 4 instead of 8 + 6, with +however a halfline tailpiece (so that the equation is +rather 12/8 + 9/2 = 21/2 + 10 1/2). + + + +(7) +_EARLY POEMS_ + + +_1 +For a Picture of +St. Dorothea_ + +I BEAR a basket lined with grass; +I am so light, I am so fair, +That men must wonder as I pass +And at the basket that I bear, +Where in a newly-drawn green litter +Sweet flowers I carry,--sweets for bitter. + +Lilies I shew you, lilies none, +None in Caesar's gardens blow,-- +And a quince in hand,--not one +Is set upon your boughs below; +Not set, because their buds not spring; +Spring not, 'cause world is wintering. + +But these were found in the East and South +Where Winter is the clime forgot.-- +The dewdrop on the larkspur's mouth +O should it then be quenchèd not? +In starry water-meads they drew +These drops: which be they? stars or dew? + +Had she a quince in hand? Yet gaze: +Rather it is the sizing moon. +Lo, linked heavens with milky ways! +That was her larkspur row.--So soon? +Sphered so fast, sweet soul?--We see +Nor fruit, nor flowers, nor Dorothy. + + +_2 +Heaven--Haven +A nun takes the veil_ + + I HAVE desired to go + Where springs not fail, +To fields where flies no sharp and sided hail + And a few lilies blow. + + And I have asked to be + Where no storms come, +Where the green swell is in the havens dumb, + And out of the swing of the sea. + +_3 +The Habit of Perfection_ + +ELECTED Silence, sing to me +And beat upon my whorlèd ear, +Pipe me to pastures still and be +The music that I care to hear. + +Shape nothing, lips; be lovely-dumb: +It is the shut, the curfew sent +From there where all surrenders come +Which only makes you eloquent. + +Be shellèd, eyes, with double dark +And find the uncreated light: +This ruck and reel which you remark +Coils, keeps, and teases simple sight. + +Palate, the hutch of tasty lust, +Desire not to be rinsed with wine: +The can must be so sweet, the crust +So fresh that come in fasts divine! + +Nostrils, your careless breath that spend +Upon the stir and keep of pride, +What relish shall the censers send +Along the sanctuary side! + +O feel-of-primrose hands, O feet +That want the yield of plushy sward, +But you shall walk the golden street +And you unhouse and house the Lord. + +And, Poverty, be thou the bride +And now the marriage feast begun, +And lily-coloured clothes provide +Your spouse not laboured-at nor spun. + + + +_POEMS 1876-1889_ + + + +_4 +THE WRECK +OF THE DEUTSCHLAND_ + + To the +happy memory of five Franciscan Nuns + exiles by the Falk Laws +drowned between midnight and morning of + Dec. 7th. 1875 + + +PART THE FIRST + +1 + Thou mastering me + God! giver of breath and bread; + World's strand, sway of the sea; + Lord of living and dead; + Thou hast bound bones and veins in me, fastened me flesh, + And after it almost unmade, what with dread, + Thy doing: and dost thou touch me afresh? +Over again I feel thy finger and find thee. + +2 + I did say yes + O at lightning and lashed rod; + Thou heardst me truer than tongue confess + Thy terror, O Christ, O God; + Thou knowest the walls, altar and hour and night: + The swoon of a heart that the sweep and the hurl of thee trod + Hard down with a horror of height: +And the midriff astrain with leaning of, laced with fire of stress. + +3 + The frown of his face + Before me, the hurtle of hell + Behind, where, where was a, where was a place? + I whirled out wings that spell + And fled with a fling of the heart to the heart of the Host. + My heart, but you were dovewinged, I can tell, + Carrier-witted, I am bold to boast, +To flash from the flame to the flame then, tower from the grace + to the grace. + +4 + I am soft sift + In an hourglass--at the wall + Fast, but mined with a motion, a drift, + And it crowds and it combs to the fall; + I steady as a water in a well, to a poise, to a pane, + But roped with, always, all the way down from the tall + Fells or flanks of the voel, a vein +Of the gospel proffer, a pressure, a principle, Christ's gift. + +5 + I kiss my hand + To the stars, lovely-asunder + Starlight, wafting him out of it; and + Glow, glory in thunder; + Kiss my hand to the dappled-with-damson west: + Since, tho' he is under the world's splendour and wonder, + His mystery must be instressed, stressed; +For I greet him the days I meet him, and bless when I understand. + +6 + Not out of his bliss + Springs the stress felt + Nor first from heaven (and few know this) + Swings the stroke dealt-- + Stroke and a stress that stars and storms deliver, + That guilt is hushed by, hearts are flushed by and melt-- + But it rides time like riding a river +(And here the faithful waver, the faithless fable and miss), + +7 + It dates from day + Of his going in Galilee; + Warm-laid grave of a womb-life grey; + Manger, maiden's knee; + The dense and the driven Passion, and frightful sweat; + Thence the discharge of it, there its swelling to be, + Though felt before, though in high flood yet-- +What none would have known of it, only the heart, being hard at bay, + +8 + Is out with it! Oh, + We lash with the best or worst + Word last! How a lush-kept plush-capped sloe + Will, mouthed to flesh-burst, + Gush!--flush the man, the being with it, sour or sweet, + Brim, in a flash, full!--Hither then, last or first, + To hero of Calvary, Christ,'s feet-- +Never ask if meaning it, wanting it, warned of it--men go. + +9 + Be adored among men, + God, three-numberèd form; + Wring thy rebel, dogged in den, + Man's malice, with wrecking and storm. + Beyond saying sweet, past telling of tongue, + Thou art lightning and love, I found it, a winter and warm; + Father and fondler of heart thou hast wrung: +Hast thy dark descending and most art merciful then. + +10 + With an anvil-ding + And with fire in him forge thy will + Or rather, rather then, stealing as Spring + Through him, melt him but master him still: + Whether at once, as once at a crash Paul, + Or as Austin, a lingering-out sweet skill, + Make mércy in all of us, out of us all +Mastery, but be adored, but be adored King. + + +_PART THE SECOND_ + +11 + 'Some find me a sword; some + The flange and the rail; flame, + Fang, or flood' goes Death on drum, + And storms bugle his fame. + But wé dream we are rooted in earth--Dust! + Flesh falls within sight of us, we, though our flower the same, + Wave with the meadow, forget that there must +The sour scythe cringe, and the blear share come. + +12 + On Saturday sailed from Bremen, + American-outward-bound, + Take settler and seamen, tell men with women, + Two hundred souls in the round-- + O Father, not under thy feathers nor ever as guessing + The goal was a shoal, of a fourth the doom to be drowned; + Yet did the dark side of the bay of thy blessing +Not vault them, the million of rounds of thy mercy not reeve + even them in? + +13 + Into the snows she sweeps, + Hurling the haven behind, + The Deutschland, on Sunday; and so the sky keeps, + For the infinite air is unkind, + And the sea flint-flake, black-backed in the regular blow, + Sitting Eastnortheast, in cursed quarter, the wind; + Wiry and white-fiery and whirlwind-swivellèd snow +Spins to the widow-making unchilding unfathering deeps. + +14 + She drove in the dark to leeward, + She struck--not a reef or a rock + But the combs of a smother of sand: night drew her + Dead to the Kentish Knock; + And she beat the bank down with her bows and the ride of + her keel: + The breakers rolled on her beam with ruinous shock; + And canvas and compass, the whorl and the wheel +Idle for ever to waft her or wind her with, these she endured. + +15 + Hope had grown grey hairs, + Hope had mourning on, + Trenched with tears, carved with cares, + Hope was twelve hours gone; + And frightful a nightfall folded rueful a day + Nor rescue, only rocket and lightship, shone, + And lives at last were washing away: +To the shrouds they took,--they shook in the hurling and + horrible airs. + +16 + One stirred from the rigging to save + The wild woman-kind below, + With a rope's end round the man, handy and brave-- + He was pitched to his death at a blow, + For all his dreadnought breast and braids of thew: + They could tell him for hours, dandled the to and fro + Through the cobbled foam-fleece, what could he do +With the burl of the fountains of air, buck and the flood of the wave? + +17 + They fought with God's cold-- + And they could not and fell to the deck + (Crushed them) or water (and drowned them) or rolled + With the sea-romp over the wreck. + Night roared, with the heart-break hearing a heart-broke rabble, + The woman's wailing, the crying of child without check-- + Till a lioness arose breasting the babble, +A prophetess towered in the tumult, a virginal tongue told. + +18 + Ah, touched in your bower of bone + Are you! turned for an exquisite smart, + Have you! make words break from me here all alone, + Do you!--mother of being in me, heart. + O unteachably after evil, but uttering truth, + Why, tears! is it? tears; such a melting, a madrigal start! + Never-eldering revel and river of youth, +What can it be, this glee? the good you have there of your own? + +19 + Sister, a sister calling + A master, her master and mine!-- + And the inboard seas run swirling and bawling; + The rash smart sloggering brine + Blinds her; but she that weather sees one thing, one; + Has one fetch in her: she rears herself to divine + Ears, and the call of the tall nun +To the men in the tops and the tackle rode over the storm's brawling. + +20 + She was first of a five and came + Of a coifèd sisterhood. + (O Deutschland, double a desperate name! + O world wide of its good! + But Gertrude, lily, and Luther, are two of a town, + Christ's lily and beast of the waste wood: + From life's dawn it is drawn down, +Abel is Cain's brother and breasts they have sucked the same.) + +21 + Loathed for a love men knew in them, + Banned by the land of their birth, + Rhine refused them. Thames would ruin them; + Surf, snow, river and earth + Gnashed: but thou art above, thou Orion of light; + Thy unchancelling poising palms were weighing the worth, + Thou martyr-master: in thy sight +Storm flakes were scroll-leaved flowers, lily showers--sweet + heaven was astrew in them. + +22 + Five! the finding and sake + And cipher of suffering Christ. + Mark, the mark is of man's make + And the word of it Sacrificed. + But he scores it in scarlet himself on his own bespoken, + Before-time-taken, dearest prizèd and priced-- + Stigma, signal, cinquefoil token +For lettering of the lamb's fleece, ruddying of the rose-flake. + +23 + Joy fall to thee, father Francis, + Drawn to the Life that died; + With the gnarls of the nails in thee, niche of the lance, his + Lovescape crucified + And seal of his seraph-arrival! and these thy daughters + And five-livèd and leavèd favour and pride, + Are sisterly sealed in wild waters, +To bathe in his fall-gold mercies, to breathe in his all-fire glances. + +24 + Away in the loveable west, + On a pastoral forehead of Wales, + I was under a roof here, I was at rest, + And they the prey of the gales; + She to the black-about air, to the breaker, the thickly + Falling flakes, to the throng that catches and quails, + Was calling 'O Christ, Christ come quickly': +The cross to her she calls Christ to her, christens her wild-worn Best. + +25 + The majesty! what did she mean? + Breathe, arch and original Breath. + Is it love in her of the being as her lover had been? + Breathe, body of lovely Death. + They were else-minded then, altogether, the men + Woke thee with a _we are perishlng_ in the weather of Gennesareth. + Or is it that she cried for the crown then, +The keener to come at the comfort for feeling the combating keen? + +26 + For how to the heart's cheering + The down-dogged ground-hugged grey + Hovers off, the jay-blue heavens appearing + Of pied and peeled May! + Blue-beating and hoary-glow height; or night, still higher, + With belled fire and the moth-soft Milky Way, + What by your measure is the heaven of desire, +The treasure never eyesight got, nor was ever guessed what for + the hearing? + +27 + No, but it was not these. + The jading and jar of the cart, + Time's tasking, it is fathers that asking for ease + Of the sodden-with-its-sorrowing heart, + Not danger, electrical horror; then further it finds + The appealing of the Passion is tenderer in prayer apart: + Other, I gather, in measure her mind's +Burden, in wind's burly and beat of endragonèd seas. + +28 + But how shall I ... make me room there; + Reach me a ... Fancy, come faster-- + Strike you the sight of it? look at it loom there, + Thing that she ... there then! the Master, + _Ipse_, the only one, Christ, King, Head: + He was to cure the extremity where he had cast her; + Do, deal, lord it with living and dead; +Let him ride, her pride, in his triumph, despatch and have done + with his doom there. + +29 + Ah! there was a heart right! + There was single eye! + Read the unshapeable shock night + And knew the who and the why; + Wording it how but by him that present and past, + Heaven and earth are word of, worded by?-- + The Simon Peter of a soul! to the blast +Tarpeian-fast, but a blown beacon of light. + +30 + Jesu, heart's light, + Jesu, maid's son, + What was the feast followed the night + Thou hadst glory of this nun? + Feast of the one woman without stain. + For so conceived, so to conceive thee is done; + But here was heart-throe, birth of a brain, +Word, that heard and kept thee and uttered thee outright. + +31 + Well, she has thee for the pain, for the + Patience; but pity of the rest of them! + Heart, go and bleed at a bitterer vein for the + Comfortless unconfessed of them-- + No not uncomforted: lovely-felicitous Providence + Finger of a tender of, O of a feathery delicacy, the breast of the + Maiden could obey so, be a bell to, ring of it, and +Startle the poor sheep back! is the shipwrack then a harvest; does + tempest carry the grain for thee? + +32 + I admire thce, master of the tides, + Of the Yore-flood, of the year's fall; + The recurb and the recovery of the gulfs sides, + The girth of it and the wharf of it and the wall; + Stanching, quenching ocean of a motionable mind; + Ground of being, and granite of it: past all + Grasp God, throned behind +Death with a sovereignty that heeds but hides, bodes but abides; + +33 + With a mercy that outrides + The all of water, an ark + For the listener; for the lingerer with a love glides + Lower than death and the dark; + A vein for the visiting of the past-prayer, pent in prison, + The-last-breath penitent spirits--the uttermost mark + Our passion-plungèd giant risen, +The Christ of the Father compassionate, fetched in the storm of + his strides. + +34 + Now burn, new born to the world, + Doubled-naturèd name, + The heaven-flung, heart-fleshed, maiden-furled + Miracle-in-Mary-of-flame, + Mid-numbered He in three of the thunder-throne! + Not a dooms-day dazzle in his coming nor dark as he came; + Kind, but royally reclaiming his own; +A released shower, let flash to the shire, not a lightning of fire + hard-hurled. + +35 + Dame, at our door + Drowned, and among our shoals, + Remember us in the roads, the heaven-haven of the + Reward: + Our King back, oh, upon English souls! + Let him easter in us, be a dayspring to the dimness of us, + be a crimson-cresseted east, + More brightening her, rare-dear Britain, as his reign rolls, + Pride, rose, prince, hero of us, high-priest, +Our hearts' charity's hearth's fire, our thoughts' chivalry's throng's + Lord. + + +_5 +Penmaen Pool_ + +_For the Visitors' Book at the Inn_ + +WHO long for rest, who look for pleasure +Away from counter, court, or school +O where live well your lease of leisure +But here at, here at Penmaen Pool? + +You'll dare the Alp? you'll dart the skiff?-- +Each sport has here its tackle and tool: +Come, plant the staff by Cadair cliff; +Come, swing the sculls on Penmaen Pool. + +What's yonder?--Grizzled Dyphwys dim: +The triple-hummocked Giant's stool, +Hoar messmate, hobs and nobs with him +To halve the bowl of Penmaen Pool. + +And all the landscape under survey, +At tranquil turns, by nature's rule, +Rides repeated topsyturvy +In frank, in fairy Penmaen Pool. + +And Charles's Wain, the wondrous seven, +And sheep-flock clouds like worlds of wool. +For all they shine so, high in heaven, +Shew brighter shaken in Penmaen Pool. + +The Mawddach, how she trips! though throttled +If floodtide teeming thrills her full, +And mazy sands all water-wattled +Waylay her at ebb, past Penmaen Pool. + +But what 's to see in stormy weather, +When grey showers gather and gusts are cool?-- +Why, raindrop-roundels looped together +That lace the face of Penmaen Pool. + +Then even in weariest wintry hour +Of New Year's month or surly Yule +Furred snows, charged tuft above tuft, tower +From darksome darksome Penmaen Pool. + +And ever, if bound here hardest home, +You've parlour-pastime left and (who'll +Not honour it?) ale like goldy foam +That frocks an oar in Penmaen Pool. + +Then come who pine for peace or pleasure +Away from counter, court, or school, +Spend here your measure of time and treasure +And taste the treats of Penmaen Pool. + +_6 +The Silver Jubilee: +To James First Bishop of Shrewsbury on the 25th Year +of his Episcopate July 28. 1876_ + +1 +THOUGH no high-hung bells or din +Of braggart bugles cry it in-- + What is sound? Nature's round +Makes the Silver Jubilee. + +2 +Five and twenty years have run +Since sacred fountains to the sun + Sprang, that but now were shut, +Showering Silver Jubilee. + +3 +Feasts, when we shall fall asleep, +Shrewsbury may see others keep; + None but you this her true, +This her Silver Jubilee. + +4 +Not today we need lament +Your wealth of life is some way spent: + Toil has shed round your head +Silver but for Jubilee. + +5 +Then for her whose velvet vales +Should have pealed with welcome, Wales, + Let the chime of a rhyme +Utter Silver Jubilee. + + +_7 +God's Grandeur_ + +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. + + +_8 +The Starlight Night_ + +LOOK at the stars! look, look up at the skies! + O look at all the fire-folk sitting in the air! + The bright boroughs, the circle-citadels there! +Down in dim woods the diamond delves! the elves'-eyes! +The grey lawns cold where gold, where quickgold lies! + Wind-beat whitebeam! airy abeles set on a flare! + Flake-doves sent floating forth at a farmyard scare!-- +Ah well! it is all a purchase, all is a prize. + +Buy then! bid then!--What?--Prayer, patience, alms, + vows. +Look, look: a May-mess, like on orchard boughs! + Look! March-bloom, like on mealed-with-yellow + sallows! +These are indeed the barn; withindoors house +The shocks. This piece-bright paling shuts the spouse + Christ home, Christ and his mother and all his hallows. + + +_9 +Spring_ + +NOTHING is so beautiful as spring-- + When weeds, in wheels, shoot long and lovely and lush; + Thrush's eggs look little low heavens, and thrush +Through the echoing timber does so rinse and wring +The ear, it strikes like lightnings to hear him sing; + The glassy peartree leaves and blooms, they brush + The descending blue; that blue is all in a rush +With richness; the racing lambs too have fair their fling. + +What is all this juice and all this joy? + A strain of the earth's sweet being in the beginning +In Eden garden. Have, get, before it cloy, + Before it cloud, Christ, lord, and sour with sinning, +Innocent mind and Mayday in girl and boy, + Most, O maid's child, thy choice and worthy the + winning. + + +_10 +The Lantern out of Doors_ + +SOMETIMES a lantern moves along the night, + That interests our eyes. And who goes there? + I think; where from and bound, I wonder, where, +With, all down darkness wide, his wading light? + +Men go by me whom either beauty bright + In mould or mind or what not else makes rare: + They rain against our much-thick and marsh air +Rich beams, till death or distance buys them quite. + +Death or distance soon consumes them: wind + What most I may eye after, be in at the end +I cannot, and out of sight is out of mind. + +Christ minds: Christ's interest, what to avow or amend + There, éyes them, heart wánts, care haúnts, foot + fóllows kínd, +Their ránsom, théir rescue, ánd first, fást, last friénd. + + +_11 +The Sea and the Skylark_ + +ON ear and ear two noises too old to end + Trench--right, the tide that ramps against the shore; + With a flood or a fall, low lull-off or all roar, +Frequenting there while moon shall wear and wend. + +Left hand, off land, I hear the lark ascend, + His rash-fresh re-winded new-skeinèd score + In crisps of curl off wild winch whirl, and pour +And pelt music, till none's to spill nor spend. + +How these two shame this shallow and frail town! + How ring right out our sordid turbid time, +Being pure! We, life's pride and cared-for crown, + + Have lost that cheer and charm of earth's past prime: +Our make and making break, are breaking, down + To man's last dust, drain fast towards man's first slime. + + +_12 +The Windhover: + +To Christ our Lord_ + +I CAUGHT this morning morning's minion, king- + dom of daylight's dauphin, dapple-dawn-drawn Fal- + con, in his riding +Of the rolling level underneath him steady air, and + striding +High there, how he rung upon the rein of a wimpling wing +In his ecstacy! then off, off forth on swing, + As a skate's heel sweeps smooth on a bow-bend: + the hurl and gliding + Rebuffed the big wind. My heart in hiding +Stirred for a bird,--the achieve of, the mastery of the + thing! + +Brute beauty and valour and act, oh, air, pride, plume, here + Buckle! AND the fire that breaks from thee then, a + billion +Times told lovelier, more dangerous, O my chevalier! + + No wonder of it: shéer plód makes plough down + sillion +Shine, and blue-bleak embers, ah my dear, + Fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermillion. + + +_13 +Pied Beauty_ + +GLORY be to God for dappled things-- + For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow; + For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim: +Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls; finches' wings; + Landscape plotted and pieced--fold, fallow, and + plough; + And àll tràdes, their gear and tackle and trim. + +All things counter, original, spare, 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. + + +_14 +Hurrahing in Harvest_ + +SUMMER ends now; now, barbarous in beauty, the + stooks rise + Around; up above, what wind-walks! what lovely + behaviour + Of silk-sack clouds! has wilder, wilful-wavier +Meal-drift moulded ever and melted across skies? + +I walk, I lift up, I lift up heart, eyes, + Down all that glory in the heavens to glean our + Saviour; + And, éyes, heárt, what looks, what lips yet gave you a +Rapturous love's greeting of realer, of rounder replies? + +And the azurous hung hills are his world-wielding + shoulder + Majestic--as a stallion stalwart, very-violet-sweet!-- +These things, these things were here and but the + beholder + Wanting; which two when they once meet, +The heart rears wings bold and bolder + And hurls for him, O half hurls earth for him off + under his feet. + + +_15 +Caged Skylark_ + +As a dare-gale skylark scanted in a dull cage + Man's mounting spirit in his bone-house, mean house, + dwells-- + That bird beyond the remembering his free fells; +This in drudgery, day-labouring-out life's age. + +Though aloft on turf or perch or poor low stage, + Both sing sometimes the sweetest, sweetest spells, + Yet both droop deadly sometimes in their cells +Or wring their barriers in bursts of fear or rage. + +Not that the sweet-fowl, song-fowl, needs no rest-- +Why, hear him, hear him babble and drop down to his nest, + But his own nest, wild nest, no prison. + +Man's spirit will be flesh-bound when found at best, +But uncumbered: meadow-down is not distressed + For a rainbow footing it nor he for his bónes rísen. + + +_16 +In the Valley of the Elwy_ + +I REMEMBER a house where all were good + To me, God knows, deserving no such thing: + Comforting smell breathed at very entering, +Fetched fresh, as I suppose, off some sweet wood. +That cordial air made those kind people a hood + All over, as a bevy of eggs the mothering wing + Will, or mild nights the new morsels of spring: +Why, it seemed of course; seemed of right it should. + +Lovely the woods, waters, meadows, combes, vales, +All the air things wear that build this world of Wales; + Only the inmate does not correspond: +God, lover of souls, swaying considerate scales, +Complete thy creature dear O where it fails, + Being mighty a master, being a father and fond. + + +_17 +The Loss of the Eurydice + +Foundered March 24. 1878_ + +1 +THE Eurydice--it concerned thee, O Lord: +Three hundred souls, O alas! on board, + Some asleep unawakened, all un- +warned, eleven fathoms fallen + +2 +Where she foundered! One stroke +Felled and furled them, the hearts of oak! + And flockbells off the aerial +Downs' forefalls beat to the burial. + +3 +For did she pride her, freighted fully, on +Bounden bales or a hoard of bullion?-- + Precious passing measure, +Lads and men her lade and treasure. + +4 +She had come from a cruise, training seamen-- +Men, boldboys soon to be men: + Must it, worst weather, +Blast bole and bloom together? + +5 +No Atlantic squall overwrought her +Or rearing billow of the Biscay water: + Home was hard at hand +And the blow bore from land. + +6 +And you were a liar, O blue March day. +Bright sun lanced fire in the heavenly bay; + But what black Boreas wrecked her? he +Came equipped, deadly-electric, + +7 +A beetling baldbright cloud thorough England +Riding: there did storms not mingle? and + Hailropes hustle and grind their +Heavengravel? wolfsnow, worlds of it, wind there? + +8 +Now Carisbrook keep goes under in gloom; +Now it overvaults Appledurcombe; + Now near by Ventnor town +It hurls, hurls off Boniface Down. + +9 +Too proud, too proud, what a press she bore! +Royal, and all her royals wore. + Sharp with her, shorten sail! +Too late; lost; gone with the gale. + +10 +This was that fell capsize, +As half she had righted and hoped to rise + Death teeming in by her portholes +Raced down decks, round messes of mortals. + +11 +Then a lurch forward, frigate and men; +'All hands for themselves' the cry ran then; + But she who had housed them thither +Was around them, bound them or wound them with her. + +12 +Marcus Hare, high her captain, +Kept to her--care-drowned and wrapped in + Cheer's death, would follow +His charge through the champ-white water-in-a-wallow. + +13 +All under Channel to bury in a beach her +Cheeks: Right, rude of feature, + He thought he heard say +'Her commander! and thou too, and thou this way.' + +14 +It is even seen, time's something server, +In mankind's medley a duty-swerver, + At downright 'No or yes?' +Doffs all, drives full for righteousness. + +15 +Sydney Fletcher, Bristol-bred, +(Low lie his mates now on watery bed) + Takes to the seas and snows +As sheer down the ship goes. + +16 +Now her afterdraught gullies him too down; +Now he wrings for breath with the deathgush brown; + Till a lifebelt and God's will +Lend him a lift from the sea-swill. + +17 +Now he shoots short up to the round air; +Now he gasps, now he gazes everywhere; + But his eye no cliff, no coast or +Mark makes in the rivelling snowstorm. + +18 +Him, after an hour of wintry waves, +A schooner sights, with another, and saves, + And he boards her in Oh! such joy +He has lost count what came next, poor boy.-- + +19 +They say who saw one sea-corpse cold +He was all of lovely manly mould, + Every inch a tar, +Of the best we boast our sailors are. + +20 +Look, foot to forelock, how all things suit! he +Is strung by duty, is strained to beauty, + And brown-as-dawning-skinned +With brine and shine and whirling wind. + +21 +O his nimble finger, his gnarled grip! +Leagues, leagues of seamanship + Slumber in these forsaken +Bones, this sinew, and will not waken. + +22 +He was but one like thousands more, +Day and night I deplore + My people and born own nation, +Fast foundering own generation, + +23 +I might let bygones be--our curse +Of ruinous shrine no hand or, worse, + Robbery's hand is busy to +Dress, hoar-hallowèd shrines unvisited; + +24 +Only the breathing temple and fleet +Life, this wildworth blown so sweet, + These daredeaths, ay this crew, in +Unchrist, all rolled in ruin-- + +25 +Deeply surely I need to deplore it, +Wondering why my master bore it, + The riving off that race +So at home, time was, to his truth and grace + +26 +That a starlight-wender of ours would say +The marvellous Milk was Walsingham Way + And one--but let be, let be: +More, more than was will yet be.-- + +27 +O well wept, mother have lost son; +Wept, wife; wept, sweetheart would be one: + Though grief yield them no good +Yet shed what tears sad truelove should. + +28 +But to Christ lord of thunder +Crouch; lay knee by earth low under: + 'Holiest, loveliest, bravest, +Save my hero, O Hero savest. + +29 +And the prayer thou hearst me making +Have, at the awful overtaking, + Heard; have heard and granted +Grace that day grace was wanted.' + +30 +Not that hell knows redeeming, +But for souls sunk in seeming + Fresh, till doomfire burn all, +Prayer shall fetch pity eternal. + + +_18 +The May Magnificat_ + +MAY is Mary's month, and I +Muse at that and wonder why: + Her feasts follow reason, + Dated due to season-- + +Candlemas, Lady Day; +But the Lady Month, May, + Why fasten that upon her, + With a feasting in her honour? + +Is it only its being brighter +Than the most are must delight her? + Is it opportunest + And flowers finds soonest? + +Ask of her, the mighty mother: +Her reply puts this other + Question: What is Spring?-- + Growth in every thing-- + +Flesh and fleece, fur and feather, +Grass and green world all together; + Star-eyed strawberry-breasted + Throstle above her nested + +Cluster of bugle blue eggs thin +Forms and warms the life within; + And bird and blossom swell + In sod or sheath or shell. + +All things rising, all things sizing +Mary sees, sympathising + With that world of good, + Nature's motherhood. + +Their magnifying of each its kind +With delight calls to mind + How she did in her stored + Magnify the Lord. + +Well but there was more than this: +Spring's universal bliss + Much, had much to say + To offering Mary May. + +When drop-of-blood-and-foam-dapple +Bloom lights the orchard-apple + And thicket and thorp are merry + With silver-surfèd cherry + +And azuring-over greybell makes +Wood banks and brakes wash wet like lakes + And magic cuckoocall + Caps, clears, and clinches all-- + +This ecstacy all through mothering earth +Tells Mary her mirth till Christ's birth + To remember and exultation + In God who was her salvation. + + +_19 +Binsey Poplars + +felled 1879_ + +MY aspens dear, whose airy cages quelled, +Quelled or quenched in leaves the leaping sun, +All felled, felled, are all felled; + Of a fresh and following folded rank + Not spared, not one + That dandled a sandalled + Shadow that swam or sank +On meadow and river and wind-wandering weed-winding + bank. + +O if we but knew what we do + When we delve or hew-- +Hack and rack the growing green! + Since country is so tender +To touch, her being só slender, +That, like this sleek and seeing ball +But a prick will make no eye at all, +Where we, even where we mean + To mend her we end her, + When we hew or delve: +After-comers cannot guess the beauty been. + Ten or twelve, only ten or twelve + Strokes of havoc únselve + The sweet especial scene, + Rural scene, a rural scene, + Sweet especial rural scene. + + +_20 +Duns Scotus's Oxford_ + +TOWERY city and branchy between towers; +Cuckoo-echoing, bell-swarmèd, lark-charmèd, rook- + racked, river-rounded; +The dapple-eared lily below thee; that country and + town did +Once encounter in, here coped and poisèd powers; + +Thou hast a base and brickish skirt there, sours +That neighbour-nature thy grey beauty is grounded +Best in; graceless growth, thou hast confounded +Rural rural keeping--folk, flocks, and flowers. + +Yet ah! this air I gather and I release +He lived on; these weeds and waters, these walls are what +He haunted who of all men most sways my spirits to peace; + +Of realty the rarest-veinèd unraveller; a not +Rivalled insight, be rival Italy or Greece; +Who fired France for Mary without spot. + + +_21 +Henry Purcell_ + +_The poet wishes well to the divine genius of Purcell +and praises him that, whereas other musicians have given +utterance to the moods of man's mind, he has, beyond +that, uttered in notes the very make and species of man as +created both in him and in all men generally._ + +HAVE fair fallen, O fair, fair have fallen, so dear +To me, so arch-especial a spirit as heaves in Henry Purcell, +An age is now since passed, since parted; with the reversal +Of the outward sentence low lays him, listed to a heresy, + here. + +Not mood in him nor meaning, proud fire or sacred fear, +Or love or pity or all that sweet notes not his might nursle: +It is the forgèd feature finds me; it is the rehearsal +Of own, of abrupt self there so thrusts on, so throngs + the ear. + +Let him Oh! with his air of angels then lift me, lay me! + only I'll +Have an eye to the sakes of him, quaint moonmarks, to + his pelted plumage under +Wings: so some great stormfowl, whenever he has walked + his while + +The thunder-purple seabeach plumè purple-of-thunder, +If a wuthering of his palmy snow-pinions scatter a + colossal smile +Off him, but meaning motion fans fresh our wits with + wonder. + + +_22 +Peace_ + +WHEN will you ever, Peace, wild wooddove, shy wings shut, +Your round me roaming end, and under be my boughs? +When, when, Peacè, will you, Peace? I'll not play + hypocrite +To own my heart: I yield you do come sometimes; but +That piecemeal peace is poor peace. What pure peace + allows +Alarms of wars, the daunting wars, the death of it? + +O surely, reaving Peace, my Lord should leave in lieu +Some good! And so he does leave Patience exquisite, +That plumes to Peace thereafter. And when Peace here + does house +He comes with work to do, he does not come to coo, +He comes to brood and sit. + + +_23 +The Bugler's First Communion + +A BUGLER boy from barrack (it is over the hill +There)--boy bugler, born, he tells me, of Irish + Mother to an English sire (he +Shares their best gifts surely, fall how things will), + +This very very day came down to us after a boon he on +My late being there begged of me, overflowing + Boon in my bestowing, +Came, I say, this day to it--to a First Communion. + +Here he knelt then ín regimental red. +Forth Christ from cupboard fetched, how fain I of feet + To his youngster take his treat! +Low-latched in leaf-light housel his too huge godhead. + +There! and your sweetest sendings, ah divine, +By it, heavens, befall him! as a heart Christ's darling, + dauntless; + Tongue true, vaunt- and tauntless; +Breathing bloom of a chastity in mansex fine. + +Frowning and forefending angel-warder +Squander the hell-rook ranks sally to molest him; + March, kind comrade, abreast him; +Dress his days to a dexterous and starlight order. + +How it dóes my heart good, visiting at that bleak hill, +When limber liquid youth, that to all I teach + Yields tender as a pushed peach, +Hies headstrong to its wellbeing of a self-wise self-will! + +Then though I should tread tufts of consolation +Dáys áfter, só I in a sort deserve to + And do serve God to serve to +Just such slips of soldiery Christ's royal ration. + +Nothing élse is like it, no, not all so strains +Us: fresh youth fretted in a bloomfall all portending + That sweet's sweeter ending; +Realm both Christ is heir to and thére réigns. + +O now well work that sealing sacred ointment! +O for now charms, arms, what bans off bad + And locks love ever in a lad! +Let mé though see no more of him, and not disappointment + +Those sweet hopes quell whose least me quickenings lift. +In scarlet or somewhere of some day seeing + That brow and bead of being, +An our day's God's own Galahad. Though this child's + drift + +Seems by a divíne doom chánnelled, nor do I cry +Disaster there; but may he not rankle and roam + In backwheels though bound home?-- +That left to the Lord of the Eucharist, I here lie by; + +Recorded only, I have put my lips on pleas +Would brandle adamantine heaven with ride and jar, did + Prayer go disregarded: +Forward-like, but however, and like favourable heaven + heard these. + + +_24 +Morning Midday and Evening Sacrifice_ + +THE dappled die-away +Cheek and wimpled lip, +The gold-wisp, the airy-grey +Eye, all in fellowship-- +This, all this beauty blooming, +This, all this freshness fuming, +Give God while worth consuming. + +Both thought and thew now bolder +And told by Nature: Tower; +Head, heart, hand, heel, and shoulder +That beat and breathe in power-- +This pride of prime's enjoyment +Take as for tool, not toy meant +And hold at Christ's employment. + +The vault and scope and schooling +And mastery in the mind, +In silk-ash kept from cooling, +And ripest under rind-- +What life half lifts the latch of, +What hell stalks towards the snatch of, +Your offering, with despatch, of! + +_25 +Andromeda_ + +Now Time's Andromeda on this rock rude, +With not her either beauty's equal or +Her injury's, looks off by both horns of shore, +Her flower, her piece of being, doomed dragon's food. + Time past she has been attempted and pursued +By many blows and banes; but now hears roar +A wilder beast from West than all were, more +Rife in her wrongs, more lawless, and more lewd. + + Her Perseus linger and leave her tó her extremes?-- +Pillowy air he treads a time and hangs +His thoughts on her, forsaken that she seems, + All while her patience, morselled into pangs, +Mounts; then to alight disarming, no one dreams, +With Gorgon's gear and barebill, thongs and fangs. + + +_26 +The Candle Indoors_ + +SOME candle clear burns somewhere I come by. +I muse at how its being puts blissful back +With yellowy moisture mild night's blear-all black, +Or to-fro tender trambeams truckle at the eye. +By that window what task what fingers ply, +I plod wondering, a-wanting, just for lack +Of answer the eagerer a-wanting Jessy or Jack +There God to aggrándise, God to glorify.-- + +Come you indoors, come home; your fading fire +Mend first and vital candle in close heart's vault: +You there are master, do your own desire; +What hinders? Are you beam-blind, yet to a fault +In a neighbour deft-handed? Are you that liar +And cast by conscience out, spendsavour salt? + + +_27 +The Handsome Heart: + +at a Gracious Answer_ + +'BUT tell me, child, your choice; what shall I buy +You?'--'Father, what you buy me I like best.' +With the sweetest air that said, still plied and pressed, +He swung to his first poised purport of reply. + +What the heart is! which, like carriers let fly-- +Doff darkness, homing nature knows the rest-- +To its own fine function, wild and self-instressed, +Falls light as ten years long taught how to and why. + +Mannerly-hearted! more than handsome face-- +Beauty's bearing or muse of mounting vein, +All, in this case, bathed in high hallowing grace . . . + +Of heaven what boon to buy you, boy, or gain +Not granted?--Only ... O on that path you pace +Run all your race, O brace sterner that strain! + + +_28 + +At the Wedding March_ + +GOD with honour hang your head, +Groom, and grace you, bride, your bed +With lissome scions, sweet scions, +Out of hallowed bodies bred. + +Each be other's comfort kind: +Déep, déeper than divined, +Divine charity, dear charity, +Fast you ever, fast bind. + +Then let the March tread our ears: +I to him turn with tears +Who to wedlock, his wonder wedlock, +Déals tríumph and immortal years. + + +_29 +Felix Randal_ + +FELIX RANDAL the farrier, O he is dead then? my duty all ended, +Who have watched his mould of man, big-boned and hardy- + handsome +Pining, pining, till time when reason rambled in it and some +Fatal four disorders, fleshed there, all contended? + +Sickness broke him. Impatient he cursed at first, but mended +Being anointed and all; though a heavenlier heart began some +Months earlier, since I had our sweet reprieve and ransom +Tendered to him. Ah well, God rest him all road ever he + offended! + +This seeing the sick endears them to us, us too it endears. +My tongue had taught thee comfort, touch had quenched thy tears, +Thy tears that touched my heart, child, Felix, poor Felix Randal; + +How far from then forethought of, all thy more boisterous years, +When thou at the random grim forge, powerful amidst peers, +Didst fettle for the great grey drayhorse his bright and battering + sandal! + + +_30 +Brothers_ + +How lovely the elder brother's +Life all laced in the other's, +Lóve-laced! what once I well +Witnessed; so fortune fell. +When Shrovetide, two years gone, 5 +Our boys' plays brought on +Part was picked for John, +Young Jóhn: then fear, then joy +Ran revel in the elder boy. +Their night was come now; all 10 +Our company thronged the hall; +Henry, by the wall, +Beckoned me beside him: +I came where called, and eyed him +By meanwhiles; making mý play 15 +Turn most on tender byplay. +For, wrung all on love's rack, +My lad, and lost in Jack, +Smiled, blushed, and bit his lip; +Or drove, with a diver's dip, 20 +Clutched hands down through clasped knees-- +Truth's tokens tricks like these, +Old telltales, with what stress +He hung on the imp's success. +Now the other was bráss-bóld: 25 +Hé had no work to hold +His heart up at the strain; +Nay, roguish ran the vein. +Two tedious acts were past; +Jack's call and cue at last; 30 +When Henry, heart-forsook, +Dropped eyes and dared not look. +Eh, how áll rúng! +Young dog, he did give tongue! +But Harry--in his hands he has flung 35 +His tear-tricked cheeks of flame +For fond love and for shame. + Ah Nature, framed in fault, +There 's comfort then, there 's salt; +Nature, bad, base, and blind, 40 +Dearly thou canst be kind; +There dearly thén, deárly, +I'll cry thou canst be kind. + + +_31 +Spring and Fall: + +to a young child_ + +MÁRGARÉT, áre you gríeving +Over Goldengrove unleaving? +Leáves, like the things of man, you +With your fresh thoughts care for, can you? +Áh! ás the heart grows older +It will come to such sights colder +By and by, nor spare a sigh +Though worlds of wanwood leafmeal lie; +And yet you wíll weep and know why. +Now no matter, child, the name: +Sórrow's spríngs áre the same. +Nor mouth had, no nor mind, expressed +What heart heard of, ghost guessed: +It is the blight man was born for, +It is Margaret you mourn for. + + +_32 +Spelt from Sibyl's Leaves_ + +EARNEST, earthless, equal, attuneable, | vaulty, voluminous, . . + stupendous +Evening strains to be tíme's vást, | womb-of-all, home-of-all, + hearse-of-all night. +Her fond yellow hornlight wound to the west, | her wild hollow + hoarlight hung to the height +Waste; her earliest stars, earl-stars, | stárs principal, overbend us, +Fíre-féaturing heaven. For earth | her being has unbound, her + dapple is at an end, as- +tray or aswarm, all throughther, in throngs; | self ín self steepèd + and pashed--qúite +Disremembering, dísmembering | àll now. Heart, you round me + right +With: Óur évening is over us; óur night | whélms, whélms, ánd + will end us. +Only the beak-leaved boughs dragonish | damask the tool-smooth + bleak light; black, +Ever so black on it. Óur tale, óur oracle! | Lét life, wáned, + ah lét life wind +Off hér once skéined stained véined varíety | upon, áll on twó + spools; párt, pen, páck +Now her áll in twó flocks, twó folds--black, white; | right, + wrong; reckon but, reck but, mind +But thése two; wáre of a wórld where bút these | twó tell, each + off the óther; of a rack +Where, selfwrung, selfstrung, sheathe- and shelterless, | thóughts + agaínst thoughts ín groans grínd. + + +_33 +Inversnaid_ + +THIS darksome burn, horseback brown, +His rollrock highroad roaring down, +In coop and in comb the fleece of his foam +Flutes and low to the lake falls home. + +A windpuff-bonnet of fáawn-fróth +Turns and twindles over the broth +Of a pool so pitchblack, féll-frówning, +It rounds and rounds Despair to drowning. + +Degged with dew, dappled with dew +Are the groins of the braes that the brook treads through, +Wiry heathpacks, flitches of fern, +And the beadbonny ash that sits over the burn. + +What would the world be, once bereft +Of wet and of wildness? Let them be left, +O let them be left, wildness and wet; +Long live the weeds and the wilderness yet. + + +_34 + +As kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies dráw fláme; +As tumbled over rim in roundy wells +Stones ring; like each tucked string tells, each hung bell's +Bow swung finds tongue to fling out broad its name; +Each mortal thing does one thing and the same: +Deals out that being indoors each one dwells; +Selves--goes itself; _myself_ it speaks and spells, +Crying _Whát I do is me: for that I came._ + +Í say móre: the just man justices; +Kéeps grace: thát keeps all his goings graces; +Acts in God's eye what in God's eye he is-- +Chríst--for Christ plays in ten thousand places, +Lovely in limbs, and lovely in eyes not his +To the Father through the features of men's faces. + + +_35 +Ribblesdale_ + +EARTH, sweet Earth, sweet landscape, with leavès throng +And louchèd low grass, heaven that dost appeal +To, with no tongue to plead, no heart to feel; +That canst but only be, but dost that long-- + +Thou canst but be, but that thou well dost; strong +Thy plea with him who dealt, nay does now deal, +Thy lovely dale down thus and thus bids reel +Thy river, and o'er gives all to rack or wrong. + + And what is Earth's eye, tongue, or heart else, where +Else, but in dear and dogged man?--Ah, the heir +To his own selfbent so bound, so tied to his turn, +To thriftless reave both our rich round world bare +And none reck of world after, this bids wear +Earth brows of such care, care and dear concern. + + +_36 +The Leaden Echo and the Golden Echo + +(Maidens' song from St. Winefred's Well)_ + +THE LEADEN ECHO + +How to keep--is there ány any, is there none such, nowhere + known some, bow or brooch or braid or brace, láce, latch + or catch or key to keep +Back beauty, keep it, beauty, beauty, beauty, . . . from vanishing + away? + + Ó is there no frowning of these wrinkles, rankèd wrinkles deep, +Dówn? no waving off of these most mournful messengers, still + messengers, sad and stealing messengers of grey? +No there's none, there's none, O no there's none, +Nor can you long be, what you now are, called fair, +Do what you may do, what, do what you may, +And wisdom is early to despair: +Be beginning; since, no, nothing can be done +To keep at bay +Age and age's evils, hoar hair, +Ruck and wrinkle, drooping, dying, death's worst, winding + sheets, tombs and worms and tumbling to decay; +So be beginning, be beginning to despair. +O there's none; no no no there's none: +Be beginning to despair, to despair, +Despair, despair, despair, despair. + + +THE GOLDEN ECHO + + Spare! +There is one, yes I have one (Hush there!); +Only not within seeing of the sun, +Not within the singeing of the strong sun, +Tall sun's tingeing, or treacherous the tainting of the earth's air. +Somewhere elsewhere there is ah well where! one, +Óne. Yes I can tell such a key, I do know such a place, +Where whatever's prized and passes of us, everything that's + fresh and fast flying of us, seems to us sweet of us and + swiftly away with, done away with, undone, +Undone, done with, soon done with, and yet dearly and + dangerously sweet +Of us, the wimpled-water-dimpled, not-by-morning-matchèd face, +The flower of beauty, fleece of beauty, too too apt to, ah! to fleet, +Never fleets more, fastened with the tenderest truth +To its own best being and its loveliness of youth: it is an ever- + lastingness of, O it is an all youth! +Come then, your ways and airs and looks, locks, maiden gear, + gallantry and gaiety and grace, +Winning ways, airs innocent, maiden manners, sweet looks, + loose locks, long locks, lovelocks, gaygear, going gallant, + girlgrace-- +Resign them, sign them, seal them, send them, motion them + with breath, +And with sighs soaring, soaring síghs deliver +Them; beauty-in-the-ghost, deliver it, early now, long before + death +Give beauty back, beauty, beauty, beauty, back to God, beauty's + self and beauty's giver. +See; not a hair is, not an eyelash, not the least lash lost; every hair +Is, hair of the head, numbered. +Nay, what we had lighthanded left in surly the mere mould +Will have waked and have waxed and have walked with the wind + what while we slept, +This side, that side hurling a heavyheaded hundredfold +What while we, while we slumbered. +O then, weary then whý should we tread? O why are we so + haggard at the heart, so care-coiled, care-killed, so fagged, + so fashed, so cogged, so cumbered, +When the thing we freely fórfeit is kept with fonder a care, +Fonder a care kept than we could have kept it, kept +Far with fonder a care (and we, we should have lost it) finer, fonder +A care kept. Where kept? Do but tell us where kept, where.-- +Yonder.--What high as that! We follow, now we follow.-- + Yonder, yes yonder, yonder, +Yonder. + + +_37 +The Blessed Virgin compared to the Air we +Breathe_ + +WILD air, world-mothering air, +Nestling me everywhere, +That each eyelash or hair +Girdles; goes home betwixt +The fleeciest, frailest-flixed +Snowflake; that's fairly mixed +With, riddles, and is rife +In every least thing's life; +This needful, never spent, +And nursing element; 10 +My more than meat and drink, +My meal at every wink; +This air, which, by life's law, +My lung must draw and draw +Now but to breathe its praise, +Minds me in many ways +Of her who not only +Gave God's infinity +Dwindled to infancy +Welcome in womb and breast, 20 +Birth, milk, and all the rest +But mothers each new grace +That does now reach our race-- +Mary Immaculate, +Merely a woman, yet +Whose presence, power is +Great as no goddess's +Was deemèd, dreamèd; who +This one work has to do-- +Let all God's glory through, 30 +God's glory which would go +Through her and from her flow +Off, and no way but so. + + I say that we are wound +With mercy round and round +As if with air: the same +Is Mary, more by name. +She, wild web, wondrous robe, +Mantles the guilty globe, +Since God has let dispense 40 +Her prayers his providence: +Nay, more than almoner, +The sweet alms' self is her +And men are meant to share +Her life as life does air. + If I have understood, +She holds high motherhood +Towards all our ghostly good +And plays in grace her part +About man's beating heart, 50 +Laying, like air's fine flood, +The deathdance in his blood; +Yet no part but what will +Be Christ our Saviour still. +Of her flesh he took flesh: +He does take fresh and fresh, +Though much the mystery how, +Not flesh but spirit now +And makes, O marvellous! +New Nazareths in us, 60 +Where she shall yet conceive +Him, morning, noon, and eve; +New Bethlems, and he born +There, evening, noon, and morn +Bethlem or Nazareth, +Men here may draw like breath +More Christ and baffle death; +Who, born so, comes to be +New self and nobler me +In each one and each one 70 +More makes, when all is done, +Both God's and Mary's Son. + Again, look overhead +How air is azurèd; +O how! nay do but stand +Where you can lift your hand +Skywards: rich, rich it laps +Round the four fingergaps. +Yet such a sapphire-shot, +Charged, steepèd sky will not 80 +Stain light. Yea, mark you this: +It does no prejudice. +The glass-blue days are those +When every colour glows, +Each shape and shadow shows. +Blue be it: this blue heaven +The seven or seven times seven +Hued sunbeam will transmit +Perfect, not alter it. +Or if there does some soft, 90 +On things aloof, aloft, +Bloom breathe, that one breath more +Earth is the fairer for. +Whereas did air not make +This bath of blue and slake +His fire, the sun would shake, +A blear and blinding ball +With blackness bound, and all +The thick stars round him roll +Flashing like flecks of coal, 100 +Quartz-fret, or sparks of salt, +In grimy vasty vault. + So God was god of old: +A mother came to mould +Those limbs like ours which are +What must make our daystar +Much dearer to mankind; +Whose glory bare would blind +Or less would win man's mind. +Through her we may see him 110 +Made sweeter, not made dim, +And her hand leaves his light +Sifted to suit our sight. + Be thou then, thou dear +Mother, my atmosphere; +My happier world, wherein +To wend and meet no sin; +Above me, round me lie +Fronting my froward eye +With sweet and scarless sky; 120 +Stir in my ears, speak there +Of God's love, O live air, +Of patience, penance, prayer: +World-mothering air, air wild, +Wound with thee, in thee isled, +Fold home, fast fold thy child. + + +_38 +To what serves Mortal Beauty?_ + +To what serves mortal beauty | dangerous; does set danc- +ing blood the O-seal-that-so | feature, flung prouder form +Than Purcell tune lets tread to? | See: it does this: keeps warm +Men's wits to the things that are; | what good means--where a glance +Master more may than gaze, | gaze out of countenance. +Those lovely lads once, wet-fresh | windfalls of war's storm, +How then should Gregory, a father, | have gleanèd else from swarm- +ed Rome? But God to a nation | dealt that day's dear chance. + To man, that needs would worship | block or barren stone, +Our law says: Love what are | love's worthiest, were all known; +World's loveliest--men's selves. Self | flashes off frame and face. +What do then? how meet beauty? | Merely meet it; own, +Home at heart, heaven's sweet gift; | then leave, let that alone. +Yea, wish that though, wish all, | God's better beauty, grace. + + +_39 +(The Soldier)_ + +YES. Whý do we áll, seeing of a soldier, bless him? bless +Our redcoats, our tars? Both these being, the greater part, +But frail clay, nay but foul clay. Here it is: the heart, +Since, proud, it calls the calling manly, gives a guess +That, hopes that, makesbelieve, the men must be no less; +It fancies, feigns, deems, dears the artist after his art; +And fain will find as sterling all as all is smart, +And scarlet wear the spirit of wár thére express. + +Mark Christ our King. He knows war, served this soldiering + through; +He of all can handle a rope best. There he bides in bliss +Now, and séeing somewhére some mán do all that man can do, +For love he leans forth, needs his neck must fall on, kiss, +And cry 'O Christ-done deed! So God-made-flesh does too: +Were I come o'er again' cries Christ 'it should be this'. + + +_40 +(Carrion Comfort)_ + +NOT, I'll not, carrion comfort, Despair, not feast on thee; +Not untwist--slack they may be--these last strands of man +In me ór, most weary, cry _I can no more_. I can; +Can something, hope, wish day come, not choose not to be. +But ah, but O thou terrible, why wouldst thou rude on me +Thy wring-world right foot rock? lay a lionlimb against + me? scan +With darksome devouring eyes my bruisèd bones? and fan, +O in turns of tempest, me heaped there; me frantic to + avoid thee and flee? + +Why? That my chaff might fly; my grain lie, sheer + and clear. +Nay in all that toil, that coil, since (seems) I kissed the rod, +Hand rather, my heart lo! lapped strength, stole joy, + would laugh, chéer. +Cheer whom though? the hero whose heaven-handling + flung me, fóot tród +Me? or me that fought him? O which one? is it each + one? That night, that year +Of now done darkness I wretch lay wrestling with (my + God!) my God. + + +_41_ + +No worst, there is none. Pitched past pitch of grief, +More pangs will, schooled at forepangs, wilder wring. +Comforter, where, where is your comforting? +Mary, mother of us, where is your relief? +My cries heave, herds-long; huddle in a main, a chief +Woe, world-sorrow; on an age-old anvil wince and sing-- +Then lull, then leave off. Fury had shrieked 'No ling- +ering! Let me be fell: force I must be brief'. + + O the mind, mind has mountains; cliffs of fall +Frightful, sheer, no-man-fathomed. Hold them cheap +May who ne'er hung there. Nor does long our small +Durance deal with that steep or deep. Here! creep, +Wretch, under a comfort serves in a whirlwind: all +Life death does end and each day dies with sleep. + + +_42 +Tom's Garland; + +upon the Unemployed_ + +TOM--garlanded with squat and surly steel +Tom; then Tom's fallowbootfellow piles pick +By him and rips out rockfire homeforth--sturdy Dick; +Tom Heart-at-ease, Tom Navvy: he is all for his meal +Sure, 's bed now. Low be it: lustily he his low lot (feel +That ne'er need hunger, Tom; Tom seldom sick, +Seldomer heartsore; that treads through, prickproof, + thick +Thousands of thorns, thoughts) swings though. Common- + weal +Little I reck ho! lacklevel in, if all had bread: +What! Country is honour enough in all us--lordly head, +With heaven's lights high hung round, or, mother-ground +That mammocks, mighty foot. But no way sped, +Nor mind nor mainstrength; gold go garlanded +With, perilous, O nó; nor yet plod safe shod sound; + Undenizened, beyond bound +Of earth's glory, earth's ease, all; no one, nowhere, +In wide the world's weal; rare gold, bold steel, bare + In both; care, but share care-- +This, by Despair, bred Hangdog dull; by Rage, +Manwolf, worse; and their packs infest the age. + + +_43 +Harry Ploughman_ + +HARD as hurdle arms, with a broth of goldish flue +Breathed round; the rack of ribs; the scooped flank; lank +Rope-over thigh; knee-nave; and barrelled shank-- + Head and foot, shoulder and shank-- +By a grey eye's heed steered well, one crew, fall to; +Stand at stress. Each limb's barrowy brawn, his thew +That onewhere curded, onewhere sucked or sank-- + Soared or sank--, +Though as a beechbole firm, finds his, as at a roll- + call, rank +And features, in flesh, what deed he each must do-- + His sinew-service where do. + +He leans to it, Harry bends, look. Back, elbow, and + liquid waist +In him, all quail to the wallowing o' the plough: + 's cheek crimsons; curls +Wag or crossbridle, in a wind lifted, windlaced-- + See his wind- lilylocks -laced; +Churlsgrace, too, child of Amansstrength, how it hangs + or hurls +Them--broad in bluff hide his frowning feet lashed! raced +With, along them, cragiron under and cold furls-- + With-a-fountain's shining-shot furls. + + +_44_ + +To seem the stranger lies my lot, my life +Among strangèrs. Father and mother dear, +Brothers and sisters are in Christ not near +And he my peace my parting, sword and strife. + England, whose honour O all my heart woos, wife +To my creating thought, would neither hear +Me, were I pleading, plead nor do I: I wear- +y of idle a being but by where wars are rife. + + I am in Ireland now; now I am at a thírd +Remove. Not but in all removes I can +Kind love both give and get. Only what word +Wisest my heart breeds dark heaven's baffling ban +Bars or hell's spell thwarts. This to hoard unheard, +Heard unheeded, leaves me a lonely began. + + +_45_ + +I WAKE and feel the fell of dark, not day. +What hours, O what black hoürs we have spent +This night! what sights you, heart, saw; ways you went! +And more must, in yet longer light's delay. + With witness I speak this. But where I say +Hours I mean years, mean life. And my lament +Is cries countless, cries like dead letters sent +To dearest him that lives alas! away. + +I am gall, I am heartburn. God's most deep decree +Bitter would have me taste: my taste was me; +Bones built in me, flesh filled, blood brimmed the curse. + Selfyeast of spirit a dull dough sours. I see +The lost are like this, and their scourge to be +As I am mine, their sweating selves; but worse. + + +_46_ + +PATIENCE, hard thing! the hard thing but to pray, +But bid for, Patience is! Patience who asks +Wants war, wants wounds; weary his times, his tasks; +To do without, take tosses, and obey. + Rare patience roots in these, and, these away, +Nowhere. Natural heart's ivy, Patience masks +Our ruins of wrecked past purpose. There she basks +Purple eyes and seas of liquid leaves all day. + + We hear our hearts grate on themselves: it kills +To bruise them dearer. Yet the rebellious wills +Of us we do bid God bend to him even so. + And where is he who more and more distils +Delicious kindness?--He is patient. Patience fills +His crisp combs, and that comes those ways we know. + + +_47_ + +MY own heart let me have more pity on; let +Me live to my sad self hereafter kind, +Charitable; not live this tormented mind +With this tormented mind tormenting yet. + I cast for comfort I can no more get +By groping round my comfortless, than blind +Eyes in their dark can day or thirst can find +Thirst's all-in-all in all a world of wet. + +Soul, self; come, poor Jackself, I do advise +You, jaded, let be; call off thoughts awhile +Elsewhere; leave comfort root-room; let joy size +At God knows when to God knows what; whose smile +'s not wrung, see you; unforeseen times rather--as skies +Betweenpie mountains--lights a lovely mile. + + +_48 +That Nature is a Heraclitean Fire and of +the comfort of the Resurrection_ + +CLOUD-PUFFBALL, torn tufts, tossed pillows | flaunt forth, then + chevy on an air- +built thoroughfare: heaven-roysterers, in gay-gangs | they throng; + they glitter in marches. +Down roughcast, down dazzling whitewash, | wherever an elm + arches, +Shivelights and shadowtackle in long | lashes lace, lance, and pair. +Delightfully the bright wind boisterous | ropes, wrestles, beats + earth bare +Of yestertempest's creases; in pool and rut peel parches +Squandering ooze to squeezed | dough, crust, dust; stanches, + starches +Squadroned masks and manmarks | treadmire toil there +Footfretted in it. Million-fuelèd, | nature's bonfire burns on. +But quench her bonniest, dearest | to her, her clearest-selvèd spark +Man, how fast his firedint, | his mark on mind, is gone! +Both are in an unfathomable, all is in an enormous dark +Drowned. O pity and indig | nation! Manshape, that shone +Sheer off, disseveral, a star, | death blots black out; nor mark + Is any of him at all so stark +But vastness blurs and time | beats level. Enough! the Resur- + rection, +A heart's-clarion! Away grief's gasping, | joyless days, dejection. + Across my foundering deck shone +A beacon, an eternal beam. | Flesh fade, and mortal trash +Fall to the residuary worm; | world's wildfire, leave but ash: + In a flash, at a trumpet crash, +I am all at once what Christ is, | since he was what I am, and +This Jack, joke, poor potsherd, | patch, matchwood, immortal + diamond, + Is immortal diamond. + + +_49 +In honour of +St. Alphonsus Rodriguez +Laybrother of the Society of Jesus_ + +HONOUR is flashed off exploit, so we say; +And those strokes once that gashed flesh or galled shield +Should tongue that time now, trumpet now that field, +And, on the fighter, forge his glorious day. +On Christ they do and on the martyr may; +But be the war within, the brand we wield +Unseen, the heroic breast not outward-steeled, +Earth hears no hurtle then from fiercest fray. + + Yet God (that hews mountain and continent, +Earth, all, out; who, with trickling increment, +Veins violets and tall trees makes more and more) +Could crowd career with conquest while there went +Those years and years by of world without event +That in Majorca Alfonso watched the door. + + +_50_ + +_Justus quidem tu es, Domine, si disputem tecum: verum- +tamen justa loquar ad te: Quare via impiorum prospera- +tur? &c._ + +THOU art indeed just, Lord, if I contend +With thee; but, sir, so what I plead is just. +Why do sinners' ways prosper? and why must +Disappointment all I endeavour end? + + Wert thou my enemy, O thou my friend, +How wouldst thou worse, I wonder, than thou dost +Defeat, thwart me? Oh, the sots and thralls of lust +Do in spare hours more thrive than I that spend, +Sir, life upon thy cause. See, banks and brakes +Now, leavèd how thick! lacèd they are again +With fretty chervil, look, and fresh wind shakes +Them; birds build--but not I build; no, but strain, +Time's eunuch, and not breed one work that wakes. +Mine, O thou lord of life, send my roots rain. + + +_51 +To R. B._ + +THE fine delight that fathers thought; the strong +Spur, live and lancing like the blowpipe flame, +Breathes once and, quenchèd faster than it came, +Leaves yet the mind a mother of immortal song. +Nine months she then, nay years, nine years she long +Within her wears, bears, cares and moulds the same: +The widow of an insight lost she lives, with aim +Now known and hand at work now never wrong. + Sweet fire the sire of muse, my soul needs this; +I want the one rapture of an inspiration. +O then if in my lagging lines you miss +The roll, the rise, the carol, the creation, +My winter world, that scarcely breathes that bliss +Now, yields you, with some sighs, our explanation. + + + +UNFINISHED POEMS +& FRAGMENTS + + +_52 +Summa_ + +THE best ideal is the true + And other truth is none. +All glory be ascribèd to + The holy Three in One. + + +_53_ + +WHAT being in rank-old nature should earlier have that + breath been +That hére pérsonal tells off these heart-song powerful +peals?-- +A bush-browed, beetle-brówed bíllow is it? +With a soúth-wésterly wínd blústering, with a tide rolls + reels +Of crumbling, fore-foundering, thundering all-surfy seas + in; seen +Únderneath, their glassy barrel, of a fairy green. + . . . . . . . . +Or a jaunting vaunting vaulting assaulting trumpet telling + + +_54 +On the Portrait of Two Beautiful +Young People + +A Brother and Sister_ + +O I admire and sorrow! The heart's eye grieves +Discovering you, dark tramplers, tyrant years. +A juice rides rich through bluebells, in vine leaves, +And beauty's dearest veriest vein is tears. + + + +Happy the father, mother of these! Too fast: +Not that, but thus far, all with frailty, blest +In one fair fall; but, for time's aftercast, +Creatures all heft, hope, hazard, interest. + +And are they thus? The fine, the fingering beams +Their young delightful hour do feature down +That fleeted else like day-dissolvèd dreams +Or ringlet-race on burling Barrow brown. + +She leans on him with such contentment fond +As well the sister sits, would well the wife; +His looks, the soul's own letters, see beyond, +Gaze on, and fall directly forth on life. + +But ah, bright forelock, cluster that you are +Of favoured make and mind and health and youth, +Where lies your landmark, seamark, or soul's star? +There's none but truth can stead you. Christ is truth. + +There's none but good can bé good, both for you +And what sways with you, maybe this sweet maid; +None good but God--a warning wavèd to +One once that was found wanting when Good weighed. + +Man lives that list, that leaning in the will +No wisdom can forecast by gauge or guess, +The selfless self of self, most strange, most still, +Fast furled and all foredrawn to No or Yes. + +Your feast of; that most in you earnest eye +May but call on your banes to more carouse. +Worst will the best. What worm was here, we cry, +To have havoc-pocked so, see, the hung-heavenward + boughs? + +Enough: corruption was the world's first woe. +What need I strain my heart beyond my ken? +O but I bear my burning witness though +Against the wild and wanton work of men. + . . . . . . . + + +_55_ + +THE sea took pity: it interposed with doom: +'I have tall daughters dear that heed my hand: +Let Winter wed one, sow them in her womb, +And she shall child them on the New-world strand.' + . . . . . . . . + + +_56 +(Ash-boughs)_ + +a. + +NOT of all my eyes see, wandering on the world, +Is anything a milk to the mind so, so sighs deep +Poetry to it, as a tree whose boughs break in the sky. +Say it is ashboughs: whether on a December day and + furled +Fast ór they in clammyish lashtender combs creep +Apart wide and new-nestle at heaven most high. +They touch heaven, tabour on it; how their talons sweep +The smouldering enormous winter welkin! May +Mells blue and snowwhite through them, a fringe and fray +Of greenery: it is old earth's groping towards the steep + Heaven whom she childs us by. + +(Variant from line 7.) b. + +They touch, they tabour on it, hover on it[; here, there + hurled], + With talons sweep +The smouldering enormous winter welkin. [Eye, + But more cheer is when] May +Mells blue with snowwhite through their fringe and fray +Of greenery and old earth gropes for, grasps at steep + Heaven with it whom she childs things by. + + +_57_ + + . . . . . . . . +HOPE holds to Christ the mind's own mirror out +To take His lovely likeness more and more. +It will not well, so she would bring about +An ever brighter burnish than before +And turns to wash it from her welling eyes +And breathes the blots off all with sighs on sighs. +Her glass is blest but she as good as blind +Holds till hand aches and wonders what is there; +Her glass drinks light, she darkles down behind, +All of her glorious gainings unaware. + . . . . . . . . +I told you that she turned her mirror dim +Betweenwhiles, but she sees herself not Him. + . . . . . . . . + + +_53 +St. Winefred's Well + +ACT I. Sc. I + +_Enter Teryth from riding, Winefred following._ + +T. WHAT is it, Gwen, my girl? why do you hover and haunt me? + +W. You came by Caerwys, sir? + +T. I came by Caerwys. + +W. There + Some messenger there might have met you from my uncle. + +T. Your uncle met the messenger--met me; and this the + message: + Lord Beuno comes to-night. + +W. To-night, sir! + +T. Soon, now: therefore + Have all things ready in his room. + +W. There needs but little doing. + +T. Let what there needs be done. Stay! with him one com- + panion, + His deacon, Dirvan Warm: twice over must the welcome be, + But both will share one cell. This was good news, + Gwenvrewi. + +W. Ah yes! + +T. Why, get thee gone then; tell thy mother I want her. + _Exit Winefred._ + No man has such a daughter. The fathers of the world + Call no such maiden 'mine'. The deeper grows her + dearness + And more and more times laces round and round my heart, + The more some monstrous hand gropes with clammy fingers + there, + Tampering with those sweet bines, draws them out, strains + them, strains them; + Meantime some tongue cries 'What, Teryth! what, thou + poor fond father! + How when this bloom, this honeysuckle, that rides the air + so rich about thee, + Is all, all sheared away, thus!' Then I sweat for fear. + Or else a funeral, and yet 'tis not a funeral, + Some pageant which takes tears and I must foot with + feeling that + Alive or dead my girl is carried in it, endlessly + Goes marching thro' my mind. What sense is this? It + has none. + This is too much the father; nay the mother. Fanciful! + I here forbid my thoughts to fool themselves with fears. + + _Enter Gwenlo._ + + . . . . . . . . . . . + + +Act II.--_Scene, a wood ending in a steep bank over a dry dene, + Winefred having been murdered within. Re-enter Caradoc + with a bloody sword._ + +C. My heart, where have we been? What have we seen, my + mind? + What stroke has Caradoc's right arm dealt? what done? + Head of a rebel + Struck off it has; written upon lovely limbs, + In bloody letters, lessons of earnest, of revenge; + Monuments of my earnest, records of my revenge, + On one that went against me whéreas I had warned her-- + Warned her! well she knew. I warned her of this work. + What work? what harm 's done? There is no harm done, + none yet; + Perhaps we struck no blow, Gwenvrewi lives perhaps; + To makebelieve my mood was--mock. I might think so + But here, here is a workman from his day's task sweats. + Wiped I am sure this was; it seems not well; for still, + Still the scarlet swings and dances on the blade. + So be it. Thou steel, thou butcher, + I cán scour thee, fresh burnish thee, sheathe thee in thy + dark lair; these drops + Never, never, never in their blue banks again. + The woeful, Cradock, the woeful word! Then what, + What have we seen? Her head, sheared from her shoulders, + fall, + And lapped in shining hair, roll to the bank's edge; then + Down the beetling banks, like water in waterfalls, + It stooped and flashed and fell and ran like water away. + Her eyes, oh and her eyes! + In all her beauty, and sunlight to it is a pit, den, darkness, + Foam-falling is not fresh to it, rainbow by it not beaming, + In all her body, I say, no place was like her eyes, + No piece matched those eyes kept most part much cast down + But, being lifted, immortal, of immortal brightness. + Several times I saw them, thrice or four times turning; + Round and round they came and flashed towards heaven: + O there, + There they did appeal. Therefore airy vengeances + Are afoot; heaven-vault fast purpling portends, and what + first lightning + Any instant falls means me. And I do not repent; + I do not and I will not repent, not repent. + The blame bear who aroused me. What I have done violent + I have like a lion done, lionlike done, + Honouring an uncontrolled royal wrathful nature, + Mantling passion in a grandeur, crimson grandeur. + Now be my pride then perfect, all one piece. Henceforth + In a wide world of defiance Caradoc lives alone, + Loyal to his own soul, laying his own law down, no law nor + Lord now curb him for ever. O daring! O deep insight! + What is virtue? Valour; only the heart valiant. + And right? Only resolution; will, his will unwavering + Who, like me, knowing his nature to the heart home, + nature's business, + Despatches with no flinching. But will flesh, O can flesh + Second this fiery strain? Not always; O no no! + We cannot live this life out; sometimes we must weary + And in this darksome world what comfort can I find? + Down this darksome world cómfort whére can I find + When 'ts light I quenched; its rose, time's one rich rose, + my hand, + By her bloom, fast by her fresh, her fleecèd bloom, + Hideous dashed down, leaving earth a winter withering + With no now, no Gwenvrewi. I must miss her most + That might have spared her were it but for passion-sake. Yes, + To hunger and not have, yét hope ón for, to storm and + strive and + Be at every assault fresh foiled, worse flung, deeper dis- + appointed, + The turmoil and the torment, it has, I swear, a sweetness, + Keeps a kind of joy in it, a zest, an edge, an ecstasy, + Next after sweet success. I am not left even this; + I all my being have hacked in half with her neck: one part, + Reason, selfdisposal, choice of better or worse way, + Is corpse now, cannot change; my other self, this soul, + Life's quick, this kínd, this kéen self-feeling, + With dreadful distillation of thoughts sour as blood, + Must all day long taste murder. What do nów then? + Do? Nay, + Deed-bound I am; one deed treads all down here cramps + all doing. What do? Not yield, + Not hope, not pray; despair; ay, that: brazen despair out, + Brave all, and take what comes--as here this rabble is come, + Whose bloods I reck no more of, no more rank with hers + Than sewers with sacred oils. Mankind, that mobs, comes. + Come! + +_Enter a crowd, among them Teryth, Gwenlo, Beuno._ + + . . . . . . . . . . . + +_After Winefred's raising from the dead and the breaking + out of the fountain._ + +BEUNO. O now while skies are blue, now while seas are salt, + While rushy rains shall fall or brooks shall fleet from + fountains, + While sick men shall cast sighs, of sweet health all despairing. + While blind men's eyes shall thirst after daylight, draughts + of daylight, + Or deaf ears shall desire that lipmusic that's lost upon them, + While cripples are, while lepers, dancers in dismal limb- + dance, + Fallers in dreadful frothpits, waterfearers wild, + Stone, palsy, cancer, cough, lung wasting, womb not bearing, + Rupture, running sores, what more? in brief, in burden, + As long as men are mortal and God merciful, + So long to this sweet spot, this leafy lean-over, + This Dry Dene, now no longer dry nor dumb, but moist + and musical + With the uproll and the downcarol of day and night + delivering + Water, which keeps thy name, (for not in róck wrítten, + But in pale water, frail water, wild rash and reeling water, + That will not wear a print, that will not stain a pen, + Thy venerable record, virgin, is recorded). + Here to this holy well shall pilgrimages be, + And not from purple Wales only nor from elmy England, + But from beyond seas, Erin, France and Flanders, every- + where, + Pilgrims, still pilgrims, móre pílgrims, still more poor pilgrims. + . . . . . . . . . . . + What sights shall be when some that swung, wretches, on + crutches + Their crutches shall cast from them, on heels of air departing, + Or they go rich as roseleaves hence that loathsome cáme + hither! + Not now to náme even + Those dearer, more divine boons whose haven the heart is. + . . . . . . . . . . . + As sure as what is most sure, sure as that spring primroses + Shall new-dapple next year, sure as to-morrow morning, + Amongst come-back-again things, thíngs with a revival, + things with a recovery, + Thy name . . . + + . . . . . . . . . . . + + +_59_ + +WHAT shall I do for the land that bred me, +Her homes and fields that folded and fed me?-- +Be under her banner and live for her honour: +Under her banner I'll live for her honour. + CHORUS. Under her banner live for her honour. + +Not the pleasure, the pay, the plunder, +But country and flag, the flag I am under-- +There is the shilling that finds me willing +To follow a banner and fight for honour. + CH. We follow her banner, we fight for her honour. + +Call me England's fame's fond lover, +Her fame to keep, her fame to recover. +Spend me or end me what God shall send me, +But under her banner I live for her honour. + CH. Under her banner we march for her honour. + +Where is the field I must play the man on? +O welcome there their steel or cannon. +Immortal beauty is death with duty, +If under her banner I fall for her honour. + CH. Under her banner we fall for her honour. + + +_60_ + +THE times are nightfall, look, their light grows less; +The times are winter, watch, a world undone: +They waste, they wither worse; they as they run +Or bring more or more blazon man's distress. +And I not help. Nor word now of success: +All is from wreck, here, there, to rescue one-- +Work which to see scarce so much as begun +Makes welcome death, does dear forgetfulness. + +Or what is else? There is your world within. +There rid the dragons, root out there the sin. +Your will is law in that small commonweal . . . + + +_61 +Cheery Beggar_ + +BEYOND Mágdalen and by the Bridge, on a place called + there the Plain, + In Summer, in a burst of summertime + Following falls and falls of rain, +When the air was sweet-and-sour of the flown fineflower of +Those goldnails and their gaylinks that hang along a lime; + . . . . . . . . + + The motion of that man's heart is fine + Whom want could not make píne, píne +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 bóld blínking gold when áll's dóne +Right rooting in the bare butt'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 turnèd 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 thát be? +_Weedio-weedio:_ there again! +So tiny a trickle of sóng-strain; +And all round not to be found +For brier, bough, furrow, or gréen ground +Before or behind or far or at hand +Either left either right +Anywhere in the súnlight. +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 tréetop +And after that off the bough + . . . . . . . +I ám so véry, O só very glad +That I dó thínk 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 shelling or broad-shed +Tatter-tassel-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 paradisaïcal fruit, | lovely in waning but + lustreless, +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 hoary +Age gasp; whose breath is our _memento mori_-- +What bass 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 massacre and wispèd wild clouds grow +Out on the giant air; tell Summer No, +Bid joy back, have at the harvest, keep Hope pale. + + +_72 +Epithalamion_ + +HARK, hearer, hear what I do; lend a thought now, make believe +We are leafwhelmed somewhere with the hood +Of some branchy bunchy bushybowered wood, +Southern dene or Lancashire clough or Devon cleave, +That leans along the loins of hills, where a candycoloured, where + a gluegold-brown +Marbled river, boisterously beautiful, between +Roots and rocks is danced and dandled, all in froth and water- + blowballs, down. +We are there, when we hear a shout +That the hanging honeysuck, the dogeared hazels in the cover +Makes dither, makes hover +And the riot of a rout +Of, it must be, boys from the town +Bathing: it is summer's sovereign good. + +By there comes a listless stranger: beckoned by the noise +He drops towards the river: unseen +Sees the bevy of them, how the boys +With dare and with downdolphinry and bellbright bodies hud- + dling out, +Are earthworld, airworld, waterworld thorough hurled, all by + turn and turn about. + +This garland of their gambols flashes in his breast +Into such a sudden zest +Of summertime joys +That he hies to a pool neighbouring; sees it is the best +There; sweetest, freshest, shadowiest; +Fairyland; silk-beech, scrolled ash, packed sycamore, wild + wychelm, hornbeam fretty overstood +By. Rafts and rafts of flake-leaves light, dealt so, painted on the air, +Hang as still as hawk or hawkmoth, as the stars or as the angels + there, +Like the thing that never knew the earth, never off roots +Rose. Here he feasts: lovely all is! No more: off with-- + down he dings +His bleachèd both and woolwoven wear: +Careless these in coloured wisp +All lie tumbled-to; then with loop-locks +Forward falling, forehead frowning, lips crisp +Over finger-teasing task, his twiny boots +Fast he opens, last he offwrings +Till walk the world he can with bare his feet +And come where lies a coffer, burly all of blocks +Built of chancequarrièd, selfquainèd rocks +And the water warbles over into, filleted with glassy grassy + quicksilvery shivès and shoots +And with heavenfallen freshness down from moorland still brims, +Dark or daylight on and on. Here he will then, here he will + the fleet +Flinty kindcold element let break across his limbs +Long. Where we leave him, froliclavish while he looks about + him, laughs, swims. + +Enough now; since the sacred matter that I mean +I should be wronging longer leaving it to float +Upon this only gambolling and echoing-of-earth note-- +What is ... the delightful dene? +Wedlock. What the water? Spousal love. + . . . . . . . . . . + . . . . . . . . . . +Father, mother, brothers, sisters, friends +Into fairy trees, wild flowers, wood ferns +Rankèd round the bower + . . . . . . . . . . + + + +EDITOR'S NOTES + + +PREFACE TO NOTES + +AN editor of posthumous work is bounden to give some account +of the authority for his text; and it is the purpose of the follow- +ing notes to satisfy inquiry concerning matters whereof the +present editor has the advantage of first-hand or particular +knowledge. + +_Sources_ The sources are four, and will be distinguished as +A, B, D, and H, as here described. + + _A_ is my own collection, a MS. book made up of +Autographs--by which word I denote poems in the author's hand- +Writing--pasted into it as they were received from him, and also +of contemporary copies of other poems. These autographs and +copies date from '67 to '89, the year of his death. Additions +made by copying after that date are not reckoned or used. The +first two items of the facsimiles at page 70 are cuttings from A. + +_B_ is a MS. book, into which, in '83, I copied from _A_ certain +poems of which the author had kept no copy. He was remiss in +making fair copies of his work, and his autograph of The Deutsch- +land having been (seemingly) lost, I copied that poem and others +from _A_ at his request. After that date he entered more poems +in this book as he completed them, and he also made both +corrections of copy and emendations of the poems which had +been copied into it by me. Thus, if a poem occur in both _A_ and +_B_, then _B_ is the later and, except for overlooked errors of +copyist, the better authority. The last entry written by G. M. H. +into this book is of the date 1887. + +_D_ is a collection of the author's letters to Canon Dixon, the +only other friend who ever read his poems, with but few exceptions +whether of persons or of poems. These letters are in my keep- +ing; they contain autographs of a few poems with late corrections. + +_H_ is the bundle of posthumous papers that came into my +hands at the author's death. These were at the time examined, +sorted, and indexed; and the more important pieces of which +copies were taken were inserted into a scrap-book. That col- +lection is the source of a series of his most mature sonnets, and +of almost all the unfinished poems and fragments. Among these +papers were also some early drafts. The facsimile after p. 92 is +from _H_. + +_Method_ The latest autographs and autographic corrections have +Been preferred. In the very few instances in which this +principle was overruled, as in Nos. _1_ and _27_, the justi- +fication will be found in the note to the poem. The finished +poems from _1_ to _51_ are ranged chronologically by the years, but +in the section _52_-_74_ a fanciful grouping of the fragments was +preferred to the inevitable misrepresentations of conjectural +dating. G. M. H. dated his poems from their inception, and +however much he revised a poem he would date his recast as his +first draft. Thus _Handsome Heart_ was written and sent to me +in '79; and the recast, which I reject, was not made before '83, +while the final corrections may be some years later; and yet his +last autograph is dated as the first 'Oxford '79'. + +_Selection_ This edition purports to convey all the author's serious +Mature poems; and he would probably not have wished any +of his earlier poems nor so many or his fragments to +have been included. Of the former class three specimens only +are admitted--and these, which may be considered of exceptional +merit or interest, had already been given to the public--but of +the latter almost everything; because these scraps being of mature +date, generally contain some special beauty of thought or diction, +and are invariably of metrical or rhythmical interest: some of +them are in this respect as remarkable as anything in the volume. +As for exclusion, no translations of any kind are published here, +whether into Greek or Latin from the English of which there +are autographs and copies in _A_ or the Englishing of Latin +hymns occurring in _H_: these last are not in my opinion of +special merit; and with them I class a few religious pieces which +will be noticed later. + +_Author's Prosody_ Of the peculiar scheme of prosody invented and +developed by the author a full account is out of the question. His +own preface together with his description of the metrical scheme of +each poem--which is always, wherever it exists, transcribed in the +notes--may be a sufficient guide for practical purposes. Moreover, +the intention of the rhythm, in places where it might seem doubtful, +has been indicated by accents printed over the determining +syllables: in the later poems these accents correspond generally +with the author's own marks: in the earlier poems they do not, but +are trustworthy translations. + +_Marks_ It was at one time the author's practice to use a very +elaborate system of marks, all indicating the speech-movement: the +autograph (in _A_) of _Harry Ploughman_ carries seven different +marks, each one defined at the foot. When reading through his +letters for the purpose of determining dates, I noted a few +sentences on this subject which will justify the method that I +have followed in the text. In 1883 he wrote: 'You were right to +leave out the marks: they were not consistent for one thing, and +are always offensive. Stilt there must be some. Either I must +invent a notation applied throughout as in music or else I must +only mark where the reader is likely to mistake, and for the +present this is what I shall do.' And again in '85: 'This is my +difficulty, what marks to use and when to use them: they are so +much needed and yet so objectionable. (_Punctuation_) About +punctuation my mind is clear: I can give a rule for everything I +write myself, and even for other people, though they might +not agree with me perhaps.' In this last matter the autographs +are rigidly respected, the rare intentional aberration being +scrupulously noted. And so I have respected his indentation of +the verse; but in the sonnets, while my indentation corresponds, +as a rule, with some autograph, I have felt free to consider +conveniences, following, however, his growing practice to eschew +it altogether. + +Apart from questions of taste--and if these poems were to be +arraigned for errors of what may be called taste, +they might be convicted of occasional affectation in +metaphor, as where the hills are 'as a stallion stal- +wart, very-violet-sweet', or of some perversion of human feeling, +as, for instance, the 'nostrils' relish of incense along the sanctuary +side ', or 'the Holy Ghost with warm breast and with ah! bright +wings', these and a few such examples are mostly efforts to force +emotion into theological or sectarian channels, as in 'the com- +fortless unconfessed' and the unpoetic line 'His mystery must be +instressed stressed', or, again, the exaggerated Marianism of +some pieces, or the naked encounter of sensualism and asceticism +which hurts the 'Golden Echo'.-- + +_Style_ Apart, I say, from such faults of taste, which few as they +numerically are yet affect my liking and more repel my sympathy +than do all the rude shocks of his purely artistic wantonness-- +apart from these there are definite faults of style which a reader +must have courage to face, and must in some measure condone before +he can discover the great beauties. For these blemishes in the +poet's style are of such quality and magnitude as to deny him even +a hearing from those who love a continuous literary decorum and +are grown to be intolerant of its absence. And it is well to be +clear that there is no pretence to reverse the condemnation of +those faults, for which the poet has duly suffered. The extravagances +are and will remain what they were. Nor can credit be gained from +pointing them out: yet, to put readers at their ease, I will here +define them: they may be called Oddity and Obscurity; (_Oddity_) +and since the first may provoke laughter when a writer serious (and +this poet is always serious), while the latter must prevent him from +being understood (and this poet has always something to say), it +may be assumed that they were not a part of his intention. Something +of what he thought on this subject may be seen in the following +extracts from his letters. In Feb. 1879, he wrote: 'All therefore +that I think of doing is to keep my verses together in one place-- +at present I have not even correct copies--, that, if anyone should +like, they might be published after my death. And that again is +unlikely, as well as remote. . . . No doubt my poetry errs on the +side of oddness. I hope in time to have a more balanced and Miltonic +style. But as air, melody, is what strikes me most of all in music +and design in painting, so design, pattern, or what I am in the +habit of calling inscape is what I above all aim at in poetry. Now +it is the virtue of design, pattern, or inscape to be distinctive +and it is the vice of distinctiveness to become queer. This vice I +cannot have escaped.' And again two months later: 'Moreover +the oddness may make them repulsive at first and yet Lang +might have liked them on a second reading. Indeed when, on +somebody returning me the _Eurydice_, I opened and read some +lines, as one commonly reads whether prose or verse, with the +eyes, so to say, only, it struck me aghast with a kind of raw +nakedness and unmitigated violence I was unprepared for: but +take breath and read it with the ears, as I always wish to be +read, and my verse becomes all right.' + +_Obscurity_ As regards Oddity then, it is plain that the poet was +Himself fully alive to it, but he was not sufficiently aware of +obscurity, and he could not understand why his friends found his +sentences so difficult: he would never have believed that, among +all the ellipses and liberties of his grammar, the one chief cause +is his habitual omission of the relative pronoun; and yet this is +so, and the examination of a simple example or two may serve a +general purpose: + +_Omission of relative pronoun_ This grammatical liberty, though it +is a common convenience in conversation and has therefore its +proper place in good writing, is apt to confuse the parts of speech, +and to reduce a normal sequence of words to mere jargon. Writers +who carelessly rely on their elliptical speech-forms to govern the +elaborate sentences of their literary composition little know what +a conscious effort of interpretation they often impose on their +readers. But it was not carelessness in Gerard Hopkins: he had full +skill and practice and scholarship in conventional forms, and it is +easy to see that he banished these purely constructional syllables +from his verse because they took up room which he thought he could +not afford them: he needed in his scheme all his space for his +poetical words, and he wished those to crowd out every merely gram- +matical colourless or toneless element; and so when he had got +into the habit of doing without these relative pronouns--though +he must, I suppose, have supplied them in his thought,--he +abuses the licence beyond precedent, as when he writes (no. _17_) +'O Hero savest!' for 'O Hero that savest!'. + +_Identical Forms_ Another example of this (from the 5th stanza of +no. _23_) will discover another cause of obscurity; the line + + 'Squander the hell-rook ranks sally to molest him' + +means 'Scatter the ranks that sally to molest him': +but since the words _squander_ and _sally_ occupy similar positions +in the two sections of the verse, and are enforced by a similar +accentuation, the second verb deprived of its pronoun will follow +the first and appear as an imperative; and there is nothing to +prevent its being so taken but the contradiction that it makes in +the meaning; whereas the grammar should expose and enforce +the meaning, not have to be determined by the meaning. More- +over, there is no way of enunciating this line which will avoid the +confusion; because if, knowing that _sally_ should not have +the same intonation as _squander_, the reader mitigates the accent, +and in doing so lessens or obliterates the caesural pause which +exposes its accent, then _ranks_ becomes a genitive and _sally_ +a substantive. + +Here, then, is another source of the poet's obscurity; that in +aiming at condensation he neglects the need that there is for care +in the placing of words that are grammatically ambiguous. +English swarms with words that have one identical form for +substantive, adjective, and verb; and such a word should never +be so placed as to allow of any doubt as to what part of speech +it is used for; because such ambiguity or momentary uncertainty +destroys the force of the sentence. Now our author not only +neglects this essential propriety but he would seem even to +welcome and seek artistic effect in the consequent confusion; +and he will sometimes so arrange such words that a reader +looking for a verb may find that he has two or three ambiguous +monosyllables from which to select, and must be in doubt as to +which promises best to give any meaning that he can welcome; +and then, after his choice is made, he may be left +with some homeless monosyllable still on his hands. (_Homophones_) +Nor is our author apparently sensitive to the irrelevant +suggestions that our numerous homophones cause; and he +will provoke further ambiguities or obscurities by straining the +meaning of these unfortunate words. + +_Rhymes_ Finally, the rhymes where they are peculiar are often +repellent, and so far from adding charm to the verse that they +appear as obstacles. This must not blind one from recognizing +that Gerard Hopkins, where he is simple and straightforward +in his rhyme is a master of it--there are many instances,--but +when he indulges in freaks, his childishness is incredible. His +intention in such places is that the verses should be recited +as running on without pause, and the rhyme occurring in their +midst should be like a phonetic accident, merely satisfying the +prescribed form. But his phonetic rhymes are often indefensible +on his own principle. The rhyme to _communion_ in 'The Bugler' +is hideous, and the suspicion that the poet thought it ingenious is +appalling: _eternal_, in 'The Eurydice', does not correspond with +_burn all_, and in 'Felix Randal' _and some_ and _handsome_ is as +truly an eye-rhyme as the _love_ and _prove_ which he despised and +abjured; and it is more distressing, because the old-fashioned +conventional eye-rhymes are accepted as such without speech- +adaptation, and to many ears are a pleasant relief from the fixed +jingle of the perfect rhyme; whereas his false ear-rhymes ask to +have their slight but indispensable differences obliterated in the +reading, and thus they expose their defect, which is of a disagree- +able and vulgar or even comic quality. He did not escape full +criticism and ample ridicule for such things in his lifetime; and +in '83 he wrote: 'Some of my rhymes I regret, but they are past +changing, grubs in amber: there are only a few of these; others +are unassailable; some others again there are which malignity +may munch at but the Muses love.' + +_Euphony and emphasis_ Now these are bad faults, and, as I said, a +reader, if he is to get any enjoyment from the author's genius, +must be somewhat tolerant of them; and they have a real relation +to the means whereby the very forcible and original effects of +beauty are produced. There is nothing stranger in these poems than +the mixture of passages of extreme delicacy and exquisite diction +with passages where, in a jungle of rough root-words, emphasis +seems to oust euphony; and both these qualities, emphasis and +euphony, appear in their extreme forms. It was an idiosyncrasy +of this student's mind to push everything to its logical extreme, +and take pleasure in a paradoxical result; as may be seen in his +prosody where a simple theory seems to be used only as a basis for +unexampled liberty. He was flattered when I called him +_perittutatos_, and saw the humour of it--and one would expect +to find in his work the force of emphatic condensation and the +magic of melodious expression, both in their extreme forms. Now +since those who study style in itself must allow a proper place +to the emphatic expression, this experiment, which supplies as +novel examples of success as of failure, should be full of +interest; and such interest will promote tolerance. + +The fragment, of which a facsimile is given after page 92, is +the draft of what appears to be an attempt to explain how an +artist has not free-will in his creation. He works out his own +nature instinctively as he happens to be made, and is irresponsible +for the result. It is lamentable that Gerard Hopkins died when, +to judge by his latest work, he was beginning to concentrate the +force of all his luxuriant experiments in rhythm and diction, and +castigate his art into a more reserved style. Few will read the +terrible posthumous sonnets without such high admiration and +respect for his poetical power as must lead them to search out the +rare masterly beauties that distinguish his work. + + + +NOTES + + +PAGE 1. AUTHOR'S PREFACE. This is from B, and must have +been written in '83 or not much later. The punctuation +has been exactly followed, except that I have added +a comma after the word _language_ in the last line but one +of page 5, where the omission seemed an oversight. + +p.4, l. 21. _rove over_. This expression is used here to denote +the running on of the sense and sound of the end of +a verse into the beginning of the next; but this meaning +is not easily to be found in the word. + +The two words _reeve_ (pf. _rove_, which is also a pf. of +_rive_) and _reave_ (pf. _reft_) are both used several times by +G.M.H., but they are both spelt _reave_. In the present +context _rove_ and _reaving_ occur in his letters, and the +spelling _reeve_ in 'The Deutschland', xii. 8, is probably due +to the copyists. + +There is no doubt that G. M. H. had a wrong notion of +the meaning of the nautical term _reeve_. No. 39 line 10 (the +third passage where _reeve_, spelt _reave_, occurs, and a +nautical meaning is required--see the note there--) would +be satisfied by _splice_ (nautical); and if this notion were +influenced by _weave_, _wove_, that would describe the inter- +weaving of the verses. In the passage referred to in 'The +Deutschland' _reeve_ is probably intended in its dialectal or +common speech significance: see Wright's 'English Dialect +Dictionary', where the first sense of the verb given is to +bring together the 'gathers' of a dress: and in this sense +_reeve_ is in common use. + +p. 7. EARLY POEMS. Two school prize-poems exist; the date of +the first, 'The Escorial', is Easter '60, which is before +Poems G.M.H. was sixteen years old. It is in Spenserian +stanza: the imperfect copy in another hand has the first +15 stanzas omitting the 9th, and the author has written +on it his motto, _Batraxos de pot akridas os tis erisda_, +with an accompanying gloss to explain his allusions. +Though wholly lacking the Byronic flush it looks as if in- +fluenced by the historical descriptions in 'Childe Harold', +and might provide a quotation for a tourist's guide to +Spain. The history seems competent, and the artistic +knowledge precocious. + +Here for a sample is the seventh stanza: + +This was no classic temple order'd round +With massy pillars of the Doric mood +Broad-fluted, nor with shafts acanthus-crown'd, +Pourtray'd along the frieze with Titan's brood +That battled Gods for heaven; brilliant-hued, +With golden fillets and rich blazonry, +Wherein beneath the cornice, horsemen rode +With form divine, a fiery chivalry-- +Triumph of airy grace and perfect harmony. + +The second prize-poem, 'A Vision of Mermaids', is dated +Xmas '62. The autograph of this, which is preserved, is +headed by a very elaborate circular pen-and-ink drawing, +6 inches in diameter,--a sunset sea-piece with rocks and +formal groups of mermaidens, five or six together, singing +as they stand (apparently) half-immersed in the shallows +as described + +'But most in a half-circle watch'd the sun,' &c. + +This poem is in 143 lines of heroics. It betrays the in- +fluence of Keats, and when I introduced the author to the +public in Miles's book, I quoted from it, thinking it useful +to show that his difficult later style was not due to in- +ability to excel in established forms. The poem is alto- +gether above the standard of school-prizes. I reprint the +extract here: + +Soon--as when Summer of his sister Spring +Crushes and tears the rare enjewelling, +And boasting 'I have fairer thing's than these' +Plashes amidst the billowy apple-trees +His lusty hands, in gusts of scented wind +Swirling out bloom till all the air is blind +With rosy foam and pelting blossom and mists +Of driving vermeil-rain; and, as he lists, +The dainty onyx-coronals deflowers, +A glorious wanton;--all the wrecks in showers +Crowd down upon a stream, and jostling thick +With bubbles bugle-eyed, struggle and stick +On.tangled shoals that bar the brook a crowd +Of filmy globes and rosy floating cloud: +So those Mermaidens crowded to my rock. + +* * * * * + +But most in a half-circle watch'd the sun; +And a sweet sadness dwelt on every one; +I knew not why,--but know that sadness dwells +On Mermaids--whether that they ring the knells +Of seamen whelm'd in chasms of the mid-main, +As poets sing; or that it is a pain +To know the dusk depths of the ponderous sea, +The miles profound of solid green, and be +With loath'd cold fishes, far from man--or what;-- +I know the sadness but the cause know not. +Then they, thus ranged, gan make full plaintively +A piteous Siren sweetness on the sea, +Withouten instrument, or conch, or bell, +Or stretch'd chords tuneable on turtle's shell; +Only with utterance of sweet breath they sung +An antique chaunt and in an unknown tongue. +Now melting upward through the sloping scale +Swell'd the sweet strain to a melodious wail; +Now ringing clarion-clear to whence it rose +Slumber'd at last in one sweet, deep, heart-broken close. + +_1862-1868_ After the relics of his school-poems follow the +poems written when an undergraduate at Oxford, of which +there are four in this book--Nos. 1, 2, 3, and 52, all +dating about 1866. Of this period some ten or twelve +autograph poems exist, the most successful being religious +verses worked in Geo. Herbert's manner, and these, I think, +have been printed: there are two sonnets in Italian form and +Shakespearian mood (refused by 'Cornhill Magazine'); the +rest are attempts at lyrical poems, mostly sentimental +aspects of death: one of them 'Winter with the Gulf-stream' +was published in 'Once a Week', and reprinted at least in +part in some magazine: the autograph copy is dated Aug. 1871, +but G. M. H. told me that he wrote it when he was at school; +whence I guess that he altered it too much to allow of its +early dating. The following is a specimen of his signature +at this date. + +Gerard M. Hopkins. +July 24, 1866. + +Transcriber's note: This signature and date is displayed as a +handwritten image in the original. + +_1868-1875_ After these last-mentioned poems there is a gap of +Silence which may be accounted for in his own words from a +letter to R. W. D. Oct. 5, '78: 'What (verses) I had written +I burnt before I became a Jesuit (i.e. 1868) and re- +solved to write no more, as not belonging to my profession, +unless it were by the wish of my superiors; so for seven +years I wrote nothing but two or three little presentation +pieces which occasion called for. But when in the winter +of '75 the Deutschland was wrecked in the mouth of the +Thames and five Franciscan nuns, exiles from Germany +by the Falck Laws, aboard of her were drowned I was +affected by the account and happening to say so to my +rector he said that he wished some one would write a poem +on the subject. On this hint I set to work and, though +my hand was out at first, produced one. I had long had +haunting my ear the echo of a new rhythm which now +I realised on paper. ... I do not say the idea is altogether +new . . . but no one has professedly used it and made it +the principle throughout, that I know of. ... However +I had to mark the stresses . . . and a great many more +oddnesses could not but dismay an editor's eye, so that +when I offered it to our magazine _The Month_ . . . they +dared not print it.' + +Of the _two or three presentation pieces_ here mentioned +one is certainly the Marian verses 'Rosa mystica', published +in the 'The Irish Monthly', May '98, and again in Orby +Shipley's 'Carmina Mariana', 2nd series, p. 183: the +autograph exists. + +Another is supposed to be the 'Ad Mariam', printed in +the 'Stonyhurst Magazine', Feb. '94. This is in five +stanzas of eight lines, in direct and competent imitation of +Swinburne: no autograph has been found; and, unless +Fr. Hopkins's views of poetic form had been provisionally +deranged or suspended, the verses can hardly be attributed +to him without some impeachment of his sincerity; and +that being altogether above suspicion, I would not yield to +the rather strong presumption which their technical skill +supplies in favour of his authorship. It is true that the +'Rosa mystica' is somewhat in the same light lilting man- +ner; but that was probably common to most of these +festal verses, and 'Rosa mystica' is not open to the +positive objections of verbal criticism which would reject +the 'Ad Mariam'. He never sent me any copy of either +of these pieces, as he did of his severer Marian poems +(Nos. 18 and 37), nor mentioned them as productions of +his serious Muse. I do not find that in either class of +these attempts he met with any appreciation at the time; +it was after the publication of Miles's book in 1894 that +his co-religionists began to recognize his possible merits, +and their enthusiasm has not perhaps been always wise. +It is natural that they should, as some of them openly +state they do, prefer the poems that I am rejecting to +those which I print; but this edition was undertaken in +response to a demand that, both in England and America, +has gradually grown up from the genuinely poetic interest +felt in the poems which I have gradually introduced to the +public:--that interest has been no doubt welcomed and +accompanied by the applause of his particular religious +associates, but since their purpose is alien to mine I regret +that I am unable to indulge it; nor can I put aside the +overruling objection that G. M. H. would not have wished +these 'little presentation pieces' to be set among his more +serious artistic work. I do not think that they would +please any one who is likely to be pleased with this book. + +1. ST. DOROTHEA. Written when an exhibitioner at Balliol +College. Contemporary autograph in A, and another +almost identical in H, both undated. Text from A. This +poem was afterwards expanded, shedding its relative pro- +nouns, to 48 lines divided among three speakers, 'an +Angel, the protonotary Theophilus, (and) a Catechumen': +the grace and charm of original lost:--there is an auto- +graph in A and other copies exist. This was the first of +the poems that I saw, and G. M. H. wrote it out for me +(in 1866?). + +2. HEAVEN HAVEN. Contemporary autograph, on same page +with last, in H. Text is from a slightly later autograph +undated in A. The different copies vary. + +3. HABIT OF PERFECTION. Two autographs in A; the earlier +dated Jan. 18, 19, 1866. The second, which is a good +deal altered, is apparently of same date as text of No. 2. +Text follows this later version. Published in Miles. + +4. WRECK OF THE DEUTSCHLAND. Text from B, title from A +(see description of B on p. 94). In 'The Spirit of Man' +the original first stanza is given from A, and varies; +otherwise B was not much corrected. Another transcript, +now at St. Aloysius' College, Glasgow, was made by +Rev. F. Bacon after A but before the correction of B. +This was collated for me by the Rev. Father Geoffrey Bliss, +S.J., and gave one true reading. Its variants are distin- +guished by G in the notes to the poem. + +The labour spent on this great metrical experiment must +have served to establish the poet's prosody and perhaps +his diction: therefore the poem stands logically as well as +chronologically in the front of his book, like a great dragon +folded in the gate to forbid all entrance, and confident in +his strength from past success. This editor advises the +reader to circumvent him and attack him later in the rear; +for he was himself shamefully worsted in a brave frontal +assault, the more easily perhaps because both subject and +treatment were distasteful to him. A good method of +approach is to read stanza 16 aloud to a chance company. +To the metrist and rhythmist the poem will be of interest +from the first, and throughout. + +Stanza iv. 1. 7. Father Bliss tells me that the Voel is a +mountain not far from St. Beuno's College in N. Wales, +where the poem was written: and Dr. Henry Bradley that +_moel_ is primarily an adj. meaning _bald_: it becomes +a fem, subst. meaning _bare hill_, and preceded by the +article _y_ becomes _voel_, in modern Welsh spelt _foel_. This +accounts for its being written without initial capital, the +word being used genetically; and the meaning, obscured +by _roped_, is that the well is fed by the trickles of water +within the flanks of the mountains.--Both A and B read +_planks_ for _flanks_; G gives the correction. + +St. xi. 5. Two of the required stresses are on _we dream_. + +St. xii. 8. _reeve_, see note on Author's Preface, p. 101. + +St. xiv. 8. _these_. G has _there_; but the words between +_shock_ and _these_ are probably parenthetical. + +St. xvi. 3. Landsmen may not observe the wrongness: see +again No. 17, st. ix, and 39, line 10. I would have cor- +rected this if the euphony had not accidentally forbidden +the simplest correction. + +St. xvi. 7. _foam-fleece_ followed by full stop in A and B, +by a comma in G. + +St. xix. 3. _hawling_ thus spelt in all three. + +St. xxi. 2. G omits _the_. + +St. xxvi. 5 and 6. The semicolon is autographic correction in +B; the stop at _Way_ is uncertain in A and B, is a comma +in G. + +St. xxix. 3. _night_ (sic). + 8. Two of the required stresses are on _Tarpeian_. + +St. xxxiv. 8. _shire_. G has _shore_; but _shire_ is doubtless +right; it is the special favoured landscape visited by the +shower. + +5. PENMAEN POOL. Early copy in A. Text, title, and punctu- +ation from autograph in B, dated 'Barmouth, Merioneth- +shire. Aug. 1876'. But that autograph writes _leisure_ +for _pleasure_ in first line; _skulls_ in stanza 2; and in +stanza 8, _month_ has a capital initial. Several copies exist, +and vary. + +St. iii. 2. _Cadair Idris_ is written as a note to _Giant's stool_. + +St. viii. 4. Several variants. Two good copies read _dark- +some danksome_; but the early copy in A has _darksome +darksome_, which B returns to. + +St. ix. 3. A has _But praise it_, and two good copies _But +honour it_. + +6. 'THE SILVER JUBILEE: in honour of the Most Reverend James +first Bishop of Shrewsbury. St. Beuno's, Vale of Clwyd. +1876, I think.' A.--Text and title from autograph in B. +It was published with somebody's sermon on the same +occasion. Another copy in H. + +7. 'GOD'S GRANDEUR. Standard rhythm counterpoised.' Two +autographs, Feb. 23, 1877; and March 1877; in A.-- +Text is from corrections in B. The second version in A +has _lightning_ for _shining_ in line 2, explained in a letter +of Jan. 4, '83. B returns to original word. + +8. 'THE STARLIGHT NIGHT. Feb. 24, '77.' Autograph in A.-- +'Standard rhythm opened and counterpointed. March +'77.' A.--Later corrected version 'St. Beuno's, Feb. 77' +in B.--Text follows B. The second version in A was +published in Miles's book 'Poets and Poetry of the Century'. + +9. 'SPRING. (Standard rhythm, opening with sprung leadings), +May 1877.' Autograph in A.--Text from corrections in B, +but punctuation from A. Was published in Miles's book +from incomplete correction of A. + +10. 'THE LANTERN. (Standard rhythm, with one sprung lead- +ing and one line counterpomted.)' Autograph in A.-- +Text, title, and accents in lines 13 and 14, from corrections in +B, where it is called 'companion to No. 26, St. Beuno's '77'. + +11. 'WALKING BY THE SEA. Standard rhythm, in parts +sprung and in others counterpomted, Rhyl, May '77.' +A. This version deleted in B, and the revision given in +text written in with new title.--G. M. H. was not pleased +with this sonnet, and wrote the following explanation of it +in a letter '82: '_Rash fresh more_ (it is dreadful to +explain these things in cold blood) means a headlong and +exciting new snatch of singing, resumption by the lark of +his song, which by turns he gives over and takes up again +all day long, and this goes on, the sonnet says, through +all time, without ever losing its first freshness, being +a thing both new and old. _Repair_ means the same thing, +renewal, resumption. The _skein_ and _coil_ are the lark's +song, which from his height gives the impression of some- +thing falling to the earth and not vertically quite but +tricklingly or wavingly, something as a skein of silk ribbed +by having been tightly wound on a narrow card or +a notched holder or as twine or fishing-tackle unwinding +from a _reel_ or _winch_ or as pearls strung on a horsehair: +the laps or folds are the notes or short measures and bars +of them. The same is called a _score_ in the musical sense +of score and this score is "writ upon a liquid sky +trembling to welcome it", only not horizontally. The lark +in wild glee _races the reel round_, paying or dealing out +and down the turns of the skein or _coil_ right to the earth +_floor_, the ground, where it lies in a heap, as it were, or +rather is all wound off on to another winch, reel, bobbin +or spool in Fancy's eye, by the moment the bird touches +earth and so is ready for a fresh unwinding at the next +flight. _Crisp_ means almost _crisped_, namely with notes.' + +12 'THE WINDHOVER. (Falling paeonic rhythm, sprung and +outriding.)' Two contemporary autographs in A.--Text +and dedication from corrected B, dated St. Beuno's, May +30, 1877. In a letter June 22, '79: 'I shall shortly send +you an amended copy of The Windhover: the amendment +only touches a single line, I think, but as that is the best +thing I ever wrote I should like you to have it in its +best form.' + +13 'PIED BEAUTY. Curtal Sonnet: sprung paeonic rhythm. +St. Beuno's, Tremeirchion. Summer '77.' Autograph in +A.--B agrees. + +14 'HURRAHING IN HARVEST: Sonnet (sprung and outriding +rhythm. Take notice that the outriding feet are not to be +confused with dactyls or paeons, though sometimes the +line might be scanned either way. The strong syllable in +an outriding foot has always a great stress and after the +outrider follows a short pause. The paeon is easier and +more flowing). Vale of Clwyd, Sept. 1, 1877.' Auto- +graph in A. Text is from corrected B, punctuation of +original A. In a letter '78 he wrote: 'The Hurrahing +sonnet was the outcome of half an hour of extreme en- +thusiasm as I walked home alone one day from fishing in +the Elwy.' A also notes 'no counterpoint'. + +15 'THE CAGED SKYLARK. (Falling paeonic rhythm, sprung +and outriding.)' Autograph in A. Text from corrected +B which dates St. Beuno's, 1877. In line 13 B writes +_úncúmberèd_. + +16. 'IN THE VALLEY OF THE ELWY. (Standard rhythm, sprung +and counterpointed.)' Autograph in A. Text is from +corrected B, which dates as contemporary with No. 15, +adding 'for the companion to this see No.' 35. + +17. THE LOSS OF THE EURYDICE. A contemporary copy in A +has this note: 'Written in sprung rhythm, the third line +has 3 beats, the rest 4. The scanning runs on without +break to the end of the stanza, so that each stanza is +rather one long line rhymed in passage than four lines +with rhymes at the ends.'--B has an autograph of the +poem as it came to be corrected ('83 or after), without +the above note and dated 'Mount St. Mary, Derbyshire, +Apr. '78'.--Text follows B.--The injurious rhymes are +partly explained in the old note. + +St. 9. _Shorten sail_. The seamanship at fault: but this ex- +pression may be glossed by supposing the boatswain to +have sounded that call on his whistle. + +St. 12. _Cheer's death_, i.e. despair. + +St, 14. _It is even seen_. In a letter May 30, '78, he ex- +plains: 'You mistake the sense of this as I feared it would +be mistaken. I believed Hare to be a brave and con- +scientious man, what I say is that _even_ those who seem +unconscientious will act the right part at a great push. . . . +About _mortholes_ I wince a little.' + +St. 26. _A starlight-wender_, i.e. The island was so Marian +that the folk supposed the Milky Way was a fingerpost to +guide pilgrims to the shrine of the Virgin at Walsingham. +_And one_, that is Duns Scotus the champion of the Im- +maculate Conception. See Sonnet No. 20. + +St. 27. _Well wept_. Grammar is as in 'Well hit! well run!' +&c. The meaning 'You do well to weep'. + +St. 28. _O Hero savest_. Omission of relative pronoun at its +worst. = _O Hero that savest_. The prayer is in a mourner's +mouth, who prays that Christ will have saved her hero, +and in stanza 29 the grammar triumphs. + +18. 'THE MAY MAGNIFICAT. (Sprung rhythm, four stresses +in each line of the first couplet, three in each of the second. +Stonyhurst, May '78.') Autograph in A.--Text from +later autograph in B. He wrote to me: 'A Maypiece in +which I see little good but the freedom of the rhythm.' +In penult stanza _cuckoo-call_ has its hyphen deleted in B, +leaving the words separate. + +19. 'BINSEY POPLARS, felled 1879. Oxford, March 1879.' Auto- +graph in A. Text from B, which alters four places. +l. 8 _weed-winding_: an early draft has _weed-wounden_. + +20. 'DUNS SCOTUS'S OXFORD. Oxford, March 1879.' Auto- +graph in A. Copy in B agrees but dates 1878. + +21. 'HENRY PURCELL. (Alexandrine: six stresses to the line. +Oxford, April 1879.)' Autograph in A with argument as +printed. Copy in B is uncorrected except that it adds the +word _fresh_ in last line. + +'"Have fair fallen." _Have_ is the sing, imperative (or +optative if you like) of the past, a thing possible and +actual both in logic and grammar, but naturally a rare +one. As in the 2nd pers. we say "Have done" or in mak- +ing appointments "Have had your dinner beforehand", +so one can say in the 3rd pers. not only "Fair fall" of +what is present or future but also "Have fair fallen" +of what is past. The same thought (which plays a great +part in my own mind and action) is more clearly expressed +in the last stanza but one of the _Eurydice_, where you +remarked it.' Letter to R. B., Feb. 3, '83. + +'The sestet of the Purcell sonnet is not so clearly worked +out as I could wish. The thought is that as the seabird +opening his wings with a whiff of wind in your face means +the whirr of the motion, but also unaware gives you +a whiff of knowledge about his plumage, the marking of +which stamps his species, that he does not mean, so +Purcell, seemingly intent only on the thought or feeling he +is to express or call out, incidentally lets you remark the +individualising marks of his own genius. + +'_Sake_ is a word I find it convenient to use ... it is the +_sake_ of "for the sake of ", _forsake_, _namesake_, _keepsake_. +I mean by it the being a thing has outside itself, as a voice +by its echo, a face by its reflection, a body by its shadow, +a man by his name, fame, or memory, _and also_ that in +the thing by virtue of which especially it has this being +abroad, and that is something distinctive, marked, speci- +fically or individually speaking, as for a voice and echo +clearness; for a reflected image light, brightness; for +a shadow-casting body bulk; for a man genius, great +achievements, amiability, and so on. In this case it is, as +the sonnet says, distinctive quality in genius. ... By +_moonmarks_ I mean crescent-shaped markings on the quill- +feathers, either in the colouring of the feather or made by +the overlapping of one on another.' Letter to R. B., +May 26, '79. + +22. 'PEACE: Oxford, 1879.' Autograph in B, where a comma +after _daunting_ is due to following a deletion. _To own +my heart_ = _to my own heart_. _Reaving Peace_, i.e. when +he reaves or takes Peace away, as No. 35, l. 12. An early +draft dated Oct. 2, '79, has _taking_ for _reaving_. + +23. 'THE BUGLER'S FIRST COMMUNION. (Sprung rhythm, +overrove, an outride between the 3rd and 4th foot of the +4th line in each stanza.) Oxford, July 27,(?) 1879.' A.-- +My copy of this in B shows three emendations. First +draft exists in H. Text is A with the corrections from B. +At nine lines from end, _Though this_, A has _Now this_, +and _Now_ is deliberately preferred in H.--B has some un- +corrected miscopyings of A. _O for, now, charms of_ A is +already a correction in H. I should like a comma at end +of first line of 5th stanza and an interjection-mark at +end of that stanza. + +24. 'MORNING MIDDAY AND EVENING SACRIFICE. Oxford, +Aug. '79.' Autograph in A. The first stanza reproduced +after p. 70. Copied by me into B, where it received cor- +rection. Text follows B except in lines 19 and 20, where +the correction reads _What Death half lifts the latch of, +What hell hopes soon the snatch of_. And punctuation is +not all followed: original has comma after the second _this_ +in lines 5 and 6. On June 30, '86, G. M. H. wrote to +Canon Dixon, who wished to print the first stanza alone +in some anthology, and made _ad hoc_ alterations which +I do not follow. The original 17th line was _Silk-ashed +but core not cooling_, and was altered because of its +obscurity. 'I meant (he wrote) to compare grey hairs to +the flakes of silky ash which may be seen round wood +embers . . . and covering a core of heat. . . .' _Your offer- +ing, with despatch, of_ is said like 'your ticket', 'your +reasons', 'your money or your life . . .' It is: 'Come, your +offer of all this (the matured mind), and without delay +either!' + +25. 'ANDROMEDA. Oxford, Aug. 12, '79.' A--which B cor- +rects in two places only. Text rejects the first, in line 4 +_dragon_ for _dragon's_: but follows B in line 10, where A +had _Air, pillowy air_. There is no comma at _barebill_ in +any MS., but a gap and sort of caesural mark in A. In +a letter Aug. 14, '79, G. M. H. writes: 'I enclose a sonnet +on which I invite minute criticism. I endeavoured in it at +a more Miltonic plainness and severity than I have any- +where else. I cannot say it has turned out severe, still +less plain, but it seems almost free from quaintness and in +aiming at one excellence I may have hit another.' + +26. 'THE CANDLE INDOORS. (Common rhythm, counter- +pointed.) Oxford, '79.' A. Text takes corrections of +B, which adds 'companion to No.' 10. A has in line 2 +_With a yellowy_, and 5 _At that_. + +27. 'THE HANDSOME HEART. (Common rhythm counter- +pointed.) Oxford, '79.' A1.--In Aug. of the same year +he wrote that he was surprised at my liking it, and in +deference to my criticism sent a revise, A2.--Subsequently +he recast the sonnet mostly in the longer 6-stress lines, +and wrote that into B.--In that final version the charm +and freshness have disappeared: and his emendation in +evading the clash of _ply_ and _reply_ is awkward; also the +fourteen lines now contain seven _whats_. I have therefore +taken A1 for the text, and have ventured, in line 8, to +restore _how to_, in the place of _what_, from the original +version which exists in H. In 'The Spirit of Man' I gave +a mixture of A1 and A2. In line 5 the word _soul_ is in +H and A1: but A2 and B have _heart_. _Father_ in second +line was the Rev. Father Gerard himself. He tells the +whole story in a letter to me. + +28. 'AT A WEDDING. (Sprung rhythm.) Bedford, Lancashire, +Oct. 21, '79.' A. Autograph uncorrected in B, but title +changed to that in text. + +29. 'FELIX RANDAL. (Sonnet: sprung and outriding rhythm; +six-foot lines.) Liverpool, Apr. 28, '80.' A. Text from +A with the two corrections of B. The comma in line 5 +after _impatient_ is omitted in copy in B. + +30. 'BROTHERS. (Sprung rhythm; three feet to the line; lines +free-ended and not overrove; and reversed or counter- +pointed rhythm allowed in the first foot.) Hampstead, +Aug. 1880.' Five various drafts exist. A1 and A2 both of +Aug. '80. B was copied by me from A1, and author's +emendations of it overlook those in A2. Text therefore is +from A 2 except that the first seven lines, being rewritten +in margin afresh (and confirmed in letter of Ap. '81 to +Canon Dixon), as also corrections in lines 15-18, these are +taken. But the B corrections of lines 22, 23, almost +certainly imply forgetfulness of A^. In last line B has +correction _Dearly thou canst be kind_; but the intention +of _I'll cry_ was original, and has four MSS. in its favour. + +31. 'SPRING AND FALL. (Sprung rhythm.) Lydiate, Lan- +cashire, Sept. 7, 1880.' A. Text and title from B, +which corrects four lines, and misdates '81. There is also +a copy in D, Jan. '81, and see again Apr. 6, '81. In line 2 +the last word is _unleafing_ in most of the MSS. An +attempt to amend the second rhyme was unsuccessful. + +32. 'SPELT FROM SIBYL'S LEAVES. (Sonnet: sprung rhythm: +a rest of one stress in the first line.)' Autograph in A-- +another later in B, which is taken for text. Date unre- +corded, lines 5, 6, _astray_ thus divided to show the +rhyme.--6. _throughther_, an adj., now confined to dialect. +It is the speech form of _through-other_, in which shape it +eludes pursuit in the Oxford dictionary. Dr. Murray +compares Ger. _durch einander_. Mr. Craigie tells me that +the classical quotation for it is from Burns's 'Halloween', +st. 5, _They roar an cry a' throughther_.--line 8. _With_, +i.e. I suppose, _with your warning that_, &c.: the heart +is speaking. 9. _beak-leaved_ is not hyphened in MS.-- +11. _part, pen, pack_, imperatives of the verbs, in the +sense of sorting 'the sheep from the goats'.--12. A has +_wrong right_, but the correction to _right wrong_ in B is +intentional. 14.--_sheathe-_ in both MSS., but I can only +make sense of _sheath-_, i.e. 'sheathless and shelterless'. +The accents in this poem are a selection from A and B. + +33. 'INVERSNAID. Sept. 28, 1881.' Autograph in H. I have +found no other trace of this poem. + +34. _As kingfishers_. Text from undated autograph in H, a draft +with corrections and variants. In lines 3 and 4 _hung_ and +_to fling out broad_ are corrections in same later pencilling +as line 5, which occurs only thus with them. In sestet +the first three lines have alternatives of regular rhythm, +thus: + + Then I say more: the just man justices; + Keeps grace and that keeps all his goings graces; + In God's eye acts, &c. + +Of these lines, in 9 and 10 the version given in text is +later than the regular lines just quoted, and probably pre- +ferred: in l. 11 the alternatives apparently of same date. + +35. 'RIBBLESDALE. Stonyhurst, 1882.' Autograph in A. Text +from later autograph in B, which adds 'companion to +No. 10' (= 16). There is a third autograph in D, June +'83 with different punctuation which gives the comma +between _to_ and _with_ in line 3. The dash after _man_ is +from A and D, both of which quote 'Nam expectatio +creaturae ', &c. from Romans viii. 19. In the letter to +R. W. D. he writes: '_Louched_ is a coinage of mine, and is +to mean much the same as slouched, slouching, and I mean +_throng_ for an adjective as we use it in Lancashire'. +But _louch_ has ample authority, see the 'English Dialect +Dictionary'. + +36. 'THE LEADEN ECHO AND THE GOLDEN ECHO. Stony- +hurst, Oct. 13, '82.' Autograph in A. Copy of this +with autograph corrections dated Hampstead '81 (_sic_) in +B.--Text takes all B's corrections, but respects punctuation +of A, except that I have added the comma after _God_ in +last line of p. 56. For the drama of Winefred, see among +posthumous fragments, No. 58. In Nov. 1882 he wrote +to me: 'I am somewhat dismayed about that piece and +have laid it aside for a while. I cannot satisfy myself +about the first line. You must know that words like +_charm_ and _enchantment_ will not do: the thought is of +beauty as of something that can be physically kept and +lost and by physical things only, like keys; then the +things must come from the _mundus muliebris_; and +thirdly they must not be markedly oldfashioned. You +will sec that this limits the choice of words very much +indeed. However I shall make some changes. _Back_ is +not pretty, but it gives that feeling of physical constraint +which I want.' And in Oct. '86 to R. W. D., 'I never did +anything more musical'. + +37. 'MARY MOTHER OF DIVINE GRACE COMPARED TO THE +AIR WE BREATHE. Stonyhurst, May '83.' Autograph +in A.--Text and title from later autograph in B. Taken +by Dean Beeching into 'A Book of Christmas Verse' 1895 +and thence, incorrectly, by Orby Shipley in 'Carmina +Mariana'. Stated in a letter to R. W. D. June 25, '83, +to have been written to 'hang up among the verse com- +positions in the tongues. ... I did a piece in the same +metre as _Blue in the mists all day_.' Note Chaucer's +account of the physical properties of the air, 'House of +Fame', ii. 256, seq. + +38. 'To WHAT SERVES MORTAL BEAUTY? (Common rhythm +highly stressed: sonnet.) Aug. 23, '85.' Autograph in +A.--Another autograph in B with a few variants from +which A was chosen, the deletion of alternatives incom- +plete. Thirdly a copy sent to R. W. D., apparently later +than A, but with errors of copy. The text given is guided +by this version in D, and _needs_ in line 9 is substituted +there for the _once_ in A and B, probably because of _once_ +in line 6.--Original draft exists in H, on same page with +39 and 40. The following is his signature at this date: + +Your affectionate friend +Gerard M. Hopkins S.J. +May 29 1885 + +Transcriber's note: This signature and date is displayed as a +handwritten image in the original. + +39. SOLDIER. 'Clongower, Aug. 1885.' Autograph in H, +with a few corrections which I have taken for lines 6 and +7, of which the first draft runs: + + It fancies; it deems; dears the artist after his art; + So feigns it finds as, &c. + +The MS. marks the caesural place in ten of the lines +in line 2, between _Both_ and _these_. l 3, at the full stop. +l. 6, _fancies_, _feigns_, _deems_, take three stresses. l. 11, +after _man_. In line 7 I have added a comma at _smart_. +In l. 10 I have substituted _handle_ for _reave_ of MS.: see +note on _reave_, p. 101; and in l. 13, have hyphened _God +made flesh_. No title in MS. + +40. CARRION COMFORT. Autograph in H, in three versions. +1st, deleted draft. 2nd, a complete version, both on same +page with 38 and 39. 3rd, with 41 on another sheet, +final (?) revision carried only to end of 1. 12 (two detached +lines on reverse). Text is this last with last two lines +from the 2nd version. Date must be 1885, and this is +probably the sonnet 'written in blood', of which he wrote +in May of that year.--I have added the title and the +hyphen in _heaven-handling_. + +41. _No worst_. Autograph in H, on same page as third draft of +40. One undated draft with corrections embodied in the +text here.--l. 5, at end are some marks which look like +a hyphen and a comma: no title. + +42. 'TOM'S GARLAND. Sonnet: common rhythm, but with +hurried feet: two codas. Dromore, Sept. '87.' With +full title, A.--Another autograph in B is identical. In +line 9 there is a strong accent on _I_.--l. 10, the capital +initial of _country_ is doubtful.--Rhythmical marks omitted. +The author's own explanation of this poem may be read +in a letter written to me from 'Dublin, Feb. 10, '88: ... +I laughed outright and often, but very sardonically, to +think you and the Canon could not construe my last son- +net; that he had to write to you for a crib. It is plain +I must go no further on this road: if you and he cannot +understand me who will? Yet, declaimed, the strange +constructions would be dramatic and effective. Must +I interpret it? It means then that, as St. Paul and Plato +and Hobbes and everybody says, the commonwealth or +well-ordered human society is like one man; a body with +many members and each its function; some higher, some +lower, but all honourable, from the honour which belongs +to the whole. The head is the sovereign, who has no +superior but God and from heaven receives his or her +authority: we must then imagine this head as bare (see +St. Paul much on this) and covered, so to say, only with +the sun and stars, of which the crown is a symbol, which +is an ornament but not a covering; it has an enormous +hat or skullcap, the vault of heaven. The foot is the day- +labourer, and this is armed with hobnail boots, because it +has to wear and be worn by the ground; which again is +symbolical; for it is navvies or day-labourers who, on the +great scale or in gangs and millions, mainly trench, tunnel, +blast, and in other ways disfigure, "mammock" the earth +and, on a small scale, singly, and superficially stamp it +with their footprints. And the "garlands" of nails they +wear are therefore the visible badge of the place they fill, +the lowest in the commonwealth. But this place still +shares the common honour, and if it wants one advantage, +glory or public fame, makes up for it by another, ease of +mind, absence of care; and these things are symbolised +by the gold and the iron garlands. (O, once explained, +how clear it all is!) Therefore the scene of the poem is +laid at evening, when they are giving over work and one +after another pile their picks, with which they earn their +living, and swing off home, knocking sparks out of mother +earth not now by labour and of choice but by the mere +footing, being strong-shod and making no hardship of hard- +ness, taking all easy. And so to supper and bed. Here +comes a violent but effective hyperbaton or suspension, in +which the action of the mind mimics that of the labourer-- +surveys his lot, low but free from care; then by a sudden +strong act throws it over the shoulder or tosses it away as +a light matter. The witnessing of which lightheartedness +makes me indignant with the fools of Radical Levellers. +But presently I remember that this is all very well for +those who are in, however low in, the Commonwealth and +share in any way the common weal; but that the curse of +our times is that many do not share it, that they are out- +casts from it and have neither security nor splendour; +that they share care with the high and obscurity with the +low, but wealth or comfort with neither. And this state +of things, I say, is the origin of Loafers, Tramps, Corner- +boys, Roughs, Socialists and other pests of society. And +I think that it is a very pregnant sonnet, and in point +of execution very highly wrought, too much so, I am +afraid. ... G.M.H.' + +43. 'HARRY PLOUGHMAN. Dromore, Sept. 1887.' Autograph +in A.--Autograph in B has several emendations written +over without deletion of original. Text is B with these +corrections, which are all good.--line 10, _features_ is the +verb.--13, _'s_ is _his_. I have put a colon at _plough_, in +place of author's full stop, for the convenience of reader.-- +15 = _his lilylocks windlaced_. 'Saxo cere- comminuit +-brum.'--17, _Them. These_, A.--In the last three lines +the grammar intends, 'How his churl's grace governs the +movement of his booted (in bluff hide) feet, as they are +matched in a race with the wet shining furrow overturned +by the share'. G. M. H. thought well of this sonnet and +wrote on Sept. 28, 1887: 'I have been touching up some +old sonnets you have never seen and have within a few +days done the whole of one, I hope, very good one and +most of another; the one finished is a direct picture of +a ploughman, without afterthought. But when you read +it let me know if there is anything like it in Walt Whit- +man; as perhaps there may be, and I should be sorry for +that.' And again on Oct. 11, '87: 'I will enclose the +sonnet on Harry Ploughman, in which burden-lines (they +might be recited by a chorus) are freely used: there is in +this very heavily loaded sprung rhythm a call for their +employment. The rhythm of this sonnet, which is alto- +gether for recital, and not for perusal (as by nature verse +should be), is very highly studied. From much consider- +ing it I can no longer gather any impression of it: perhaps +it will strike you as intolerably violent and artificial.' And +again on Nov. 6, '87: 'I want Harry Ploughman to be +a vivid figure before the mind's eye; if he is not that the +sonnet fails. The difficulties are of syntax no doubt. +Dividing a compound word by a clause sandwiched into it +was a desperate deed, I feel, and I do not feel that it was +an unquestionable success.' + +44, 45, 46, 47. These four sonnets (together with No. 56) are +all written undated in a small hand on the two sides of +a half-sheet of common sermon-paper, in the order in which +they are here printed. They probably date back as early +as 1885, and may be all, or some of them, those referred to +in a letter of Sept. 1, 1885: 'I shall shortly have some +sonnets to send you, five or more. Four of these came +like inspirations unbidden and against my will. And in +the life I lead now, which is one of a continually jaded +and harassed mind, if in any leisure I try to do anything +I make no way--nor with my work, alas! but so it must +be.' I have no certain nor single identification of date. + +44. _To seem the stranger_. H, with corrections which my text +embodies.--l. 14, _began_. I have no other explanation +than to suppose an omitted relative pronoun, like _Hero +savest_ in No. 17. The sentence would then stand for +'leaves me a lonely (one who only) began'. No title. + +45. _I wake and feel_. H, with corrections which text embodies: +no title. + +46. PATIENCE. As 45. l. 2, _Patience is_. The initial capital is +mine, and the comma after _ivy_ in line 6. No title. + +47 _My own heart_. As 45.--1. 6, I have added the comma after +_comfortless_; that word has the same grammatical value as +_dark_ in the following line. 'I cast for comfort, (which) +I can no more find in my comfortless (world) than a blind +man in his dark world. . . .'--l. 10, MS. accents _let_.-- +13 and 14, the text here from a good correction separately +written (as far as _mountains_) on the top margin of No. 56. +There are therefore two writings of _betweenpie_, a strange +word, in which _pie_ apparently makes a compound verb +with _between_, meaning 'as the sky seen between dark +mountains is brightly dappled', the grammar such as +_intervariegates_ would make. This word might have +delighted William Barnes, if the verb 'to pie' existed. +It seems not to exist, and to be forbidden by homophonic +absurdities. + +48. 'HERACLITEAN FIRE. (Sprung rhythm, with many out- +rides and hurried feet: sonnet with two [_sic_] codas.) +July 26, 1888. Co. Dublin. The last sonnet [this] pro- +visional only.' Autograph in A.--I have found no other +copy nor trace of draft. The title is from A.--line 6, con- +struction obscure, _rutpeel_ may be a compound word, +MS. uncertain. 8, ? omitted relative pronoun. If so = +'the manmarks that treadmire toil foot-fretted in it'. MS. +does not hyphen nor quite join up _foot_ with _fretted_.-- +12. MS. has no caesural mark.--On Aug. 18, '88, he +wrote: 'I will now go to bed, the more so as I am going to +preach tomorrow and put plainly to a Highland congrega- +tion of MacDonalds, Mackintoshes, Mackillops, and the +rest what I am putting not at all so plainly to the rest of +the world, or rather to you and Canon Dixon, in a sonnet +in sprung rhythm with two codas.' And again on Sept. +25, '88: 'Lately I sent you a sonnet on the Heraclitean +Fire, in which a great deal of early Greek philosophical +thought was distilled; but the liquor of the distillation +did not taste very greek, did it? The effect of studying +masterpieces is to make me admire and do otherwise. So +it must be on every original artist to some degree, on me +to a marked degree. Perhaps then more reading would +only _refine my singularity_, which is not what you want.' +Note, that the sonnet has three codas, not two. + +49. ALFONSUS. Text from autograph with title and 'upon the +first falling of his feast after his canonisation' in B. An +autograph in A, sent Oct. 3 from Dublin asking for im- +mediate criticism, because the sonnet had to go to Majorca. +'I ask your opinion of a sonnet written to order on the +occasion of the first feast since his canonisation proper of +St. Alphonsus Rodriguez, a laybrother of our Order, who +for 40 years acted as hall porter to the College of Palma +in Majorca; he was, it is believed, much favoured by God +with heavenly light and much persecuted by evil spirits. +The sonnet (I say it snorting) aims at being intelligible.' +And on Oct. 9, '88, 'I am obliged for your criticisms, "con- +tents of which noted", indeed acted on. I have improved +the sestet. . . . (He defends 'hew') ... at any rate +whatever is markedly featured in stone or what is like +stone is most naturally said to be hewn, and to _shape_, +itself, means in old English to hew and the Hebrew _bara_ +to create, even, properly means to hew. But life and +living things are not naturally said to be hewn: they grow, +and their growth is by trickling increment. . . . The (first) +line now stands "Glory is a flame off exploit, so we say ".' + +50. 'JUSTUS ES, &c. Jer. xii. 1 (for title), March 17,'89.' +Autograph in A.--Similar autograph in B, which reads +line 9, _Sir, life on thy great cause_. Text from A, which +seems the later, being written in the peculiar faint ink of +the corrections in B, and embodying them.--Early drafts +in H. + +51. 'To R. B. April 22, '89.' Autograph in A. This, the last +poem sent to me, came on April 29.--No other copy, but +the working drafts in H.--In line 6 the word _moulds_ was +substituted by me for _combs_ of original, when the sonnet +was published by Miles; and I leave it, having no doubt +that G. M. H. would have made some such alteration. + +52. 'SUMMA.' This poem had, I believe, the ambitious design +which its title suggests. What was done of it was destroyed, +with other things, when he joined the Jesuits. My copy +is a contemporary autograph of 16 lines, written when he +was still an undergraduate; I give the first four. A. + +53. _What being_. Two scraps in H. I take the apparently later +one, and have inserted the comma in line 3. + +54. 'ON THE PORTRAIT, &c. Monastereven, Co. Kildare, +Christmas, '86.' Autograph with full title, no corrections, +in A. Early drafts in H. + +55. _The sea took pity_. Undated pencil scrap in H. + +56. ASHBOUGHS (my title). In H in two versions; first as +a curtal sonnet (like 13 and 22) on same sheet with the +four sonnets 44-47, and preceding them: second, an +apparently later version in the same metre on a page by +itself; with expanded variation from seventh line, making +thirteen lines for eleven. I print the whole of this second +MS., and have put brackets to show what I think would +make the best version of the poem: for if the bracketed +words were omitted the original curtal sonnet form would +be preserved and carry the good corrections. The uncom- +fortable _eye_ in the added portion was perhaps to be worked +as a vocative referring to first line (?). + +57. _Hope holds_. In H, a torn undated scrap which carries +a vivid splotch of local colour.--line 4, a variant has +_A growing burnish brighter than_. + +58. ST. WINEFRED. G. M. H. began a tragedy on St. Winefred +Oct. '79, for which he subsequently wrote the chorus, +No. 36, above. He was at it again in 1881, and had +mentioned the play in his letters, and when, some years +later, I determined to write my _Feast of Bacchus_ in six- +stressed verse, I sent him a sample of it, and asked him to +let me see what he had made of the measure. The MS. +which he sent me, April 1, 1885, was copied, and that +copy is the text in this book, from A, the original not +being discoverable. It may therefore contain copyist's +errors. Twenty years later, when I was writing my +_Demeter_ for the lady-students at Somerville College, I re- +membered the first line of Caradoc's soliloquy, and made +some use of it. On the other hand the broken line _I have +read her eyes_ in my 1st part of _Nero_ is proved by date to +be a coincidence, and not a reminiscence.--Caradoc was +to 'die impenitent, struck by the finger of God'. + +59. _What shall I do_. Sent me in a letter with his own melody +and a note on the poem. 'This is not final of course. +Perhaps the name of England is too exclusive.' Date +Clongower, Aug. 1885. A. + +60. _The times are nightfall_. Revised and corrected draft in H. +The first two lines are corrected from the original opening +in old syllabic verse: + + The times are nightfall and the light grows less; + The times are winter and a world undone; + +61. 'CHEERY BEGGAR.' Undated draft with much correction, +in H. Text is the outcome. + +62 and 63. These are my interpretation of the intention of some +unfinished disordered verses on a sheet of paper in H. In +63, line 1, _furl_ is I think unmistakable: an apparently +rejected earlier version had _Soft childhood's carmine +dew-drift down_. + +64. 'THE WOODLARK.' Draft on one sheet of small notepaper +in H. Fragments in some disorder: the arrangement of +them in the text satisfies me. The word _sheath_ is +printed for _sheaf_ of MS., and _sheaf_ recurs in correc- +tions. Dating of July 5, '76. + +65. 'MOONRISE. June 19, 1876.' H. Note at foot shows +intention to rewrite with one stress more in the second +half of each line, and the first is thus rewritten 'in the +white of the dusk, in the walk of the morning'. + +66. CUCKOO. From a scrap in H without date or title. + +67. It being impossible to satisfy myself I give this MS. in +facsimile as an example, after p. 92. + +68. _The child is father_. From a newspaper cutting with another +very poor comic triolet sent me by G. M. H. They are +signed _BRAN_. His comic attempts were not generally so +successful as this is. + +69. _The shepherd's brow_. In H. Various consecutive full +drafts on the same sheet as 51, and date April 3, '89. +The text is what seems to be the latest draft: it has no +corrections. Thus its date is between 50 and 51. It +might be argued that this sonnet has the same right to be +recognised as a finished poem with the sonnets 44-47, but +those had several years recognition whereas this must have +been thrown off one day in a cynical mood, which he +could not have wished permanently to intrude among his +last serious poems. + +70. 'TO HIS WATCH.' H. On a sheet by itself; apparently +a fair copy with corrections embodied in this text, except +that the original 8th line, which is not deleted, is preferred +to the alternative suggestion, _Is sweetest comfort's carol +or worst woe's smart_. + +71. _Strike, churl_. H, on same page with a draft of part of +No. 45.--l. 4, _Have at_ is a correction for _aim at_.--This +scrap is some evidence for the earlier dating of the four +sonnets. + +72. 'EPITHALAMION.' Four sides of pencilled rough sketches, +and five sides of quarto first draft, on 'Royal University +of Ireland' candidates paper, as if G. M. H. had written +it while supervising an examination. Fragments in disorder +with erasures and corrections; undated. H.--The text, +which omits only two disconnected lines, is my arrange- +ment of the fragments, and embodies the latest corrections. +It was to have been an Ode on the occasion of his brother's +marriage, which fixes the date as 1888. It is mentioned +in a letter of May 25, whence the title comes.--I have +printed _dene_ for _dean_ (in two places). In l. 9 of poem +cover = covert, which should be in text, as G. M. H. never +spelt phonetically.--l. 11, _of_ may be _at_, MS. uncertain.-- +page 90, line 16, _shoots_ is, I think, a noun. + +73. _Thee, God, I come from_. Unfinished draft in H. Undated, +probably '85, on same sheet with first draft of No. 38.-- +l. 2, _day long_. MS. as two words with accent on _day_.-- +l. 17, above the words _before me_ the words _left with me_ +are written as alternative, but text is not deleted. All the +rest of this hymn is without question. In l. 19, _Yea_ is +right. After the verses printed in text there is some +versified _credo_ intended to form part of the complete +poem; thus: + + Jesus Christ sacrificed + On the cross. . . . + Moulded, he, in maiden's womb, + Lived and died and from the tomb + Rose in power and is our + Judge that comes to deal our doom. + +74. _To him who_. Text is an underlined version among working +drafts in H.--line 6, _freed_ = got rid of, banished. This sense +of the word is obsolete; it occurs twice in Shakespeare, +cp. Cymb. III. vi. 79, 'He wrings at some distress . . . +would I could free 't!'. + + + +FINIS + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins, by +Gerard Manley Hopkins + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK POEMS OF GERARD MANLEY HOPKINS *** + +***** This file should be named 22403-8.txt or 22403-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/2/4/0/22403/ + +Produced by Lewis Jones + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +http://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at http://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit http://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. diff --git a/22403-8.zip b/22403-8.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..9cbe2be --- /dev/null +++ b/22403-8.zip diff --git a/22403.txt b/22403.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..ddf0bff --- /dev/null +++ b/22403.txt @@ -0,0 +1,4821 @@ +Project Gutenberg's Poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins, by Gerard Manley Hopkins + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins + Now First Published + +Author: Gerard Manley Hopkins + +Editor: Robert Bridges + +Release Date: August 26, 2007 [EBook #22403] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK POEMS OF GERARD MANLEY HOPKINS *** + + + + +Produced by Lewis Jones + + + + + +Hopkins, Gerard Manley (1918) "Poems" + + + +_Poems_ + +of + +Gerard Manley Hopkins + +now first published + +Edited with notes + +by + +ROBERT BRIDGES + +Poet Laureate + + +LONDON + +HUMPHREY MILFORD + + + +_CATHARINAE_ + +HVNC LIBRVM + +QVI FILA EIVS CARISSIMI + +POETAE DEBITAM INGENIO LAVDEM EXPECTANTIS + +SERVM TAMEN MONVMENTVM ESSET + +ANNVM AETATIS XCVIII AGENTI + +VETERIS AMICITIAE PIGNVS + +D D D + +_R B_ + + + +Transcriber's notes: The poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins contain +unconventional English, accents and horizontal lines. Facsimile +images of the poems as originally published are freely available +online from the Internet Archive. Please use these images to +check for any errors or inadequacies in this electronic text. + +The editor's endnotes refer to the page numbers of the +Author's _Preface_ and to the first page of the _Early Poems_. +I have therefore inserted these page numbers in round brackets: +(1), (2), etc. up to (7). For pages 1 to 7 the line numbers in +this electronic version are the same as those referred to in the +editor's endnotes. + +After page 7 this text mainly follows the editor's endnotes +which, apart from the occasional page reference, refer to the +poems by their numbers. For example: + +5. PENMAEN POOL. + +In poem _26_ I have retained the larger than normal spacing +between the first and second words of the eighth line. + +In poem _36_ I have rendered the first word of line 28 as "One." +In the original the accent falls on the second letter but I did +not have a text character to record this accurately. + +The editor's notes contain one word and, later, one phrase from +the ancient Greek; these are retained but the Greek letters have +been Englished. + + + +CONTENTS + +Author's Preface +Early Poems +Poems 1876-1889 +Unfinished Poems & Fragments + + +EDITORIAL + +Preface to Notes +Notes + + +OUR generation already is overpast, +And thy lov'd legacy, Gerard, hath lain +Coy in my home; as once thy heart was fain +Of shelter, when God's terror held thee fast +In life's wild wood at Beauty and Sorrow aghast; +Thy sainted sense tramme'd in ghostly pain, +Thy rare ill-broker'd talent in disdain: +Yet love of Christ will win man's love at last. + + Hell wars without; but, dear, the while my hands +Gather'd thy book, I heard, this wintry day, +Thy spirit thank me, in his young delight +Stepping again upon the yellow sands. + Go forth: amidst our chaffinch flock display +Thy plumage of far wonder and heavenward flight! + +Chilswell, Jan. 1918. + + +(1) AUTHOR'S PREFACE + +THE poems in this book* (*That is, the MS. +described in Editor's preface as B. This +preface does not apply to the early poems.) +are written some in Running Rhythm, the common +rhythm in English use, some in Sprung Rhythm, +and some in a mixture of the two. And those in +the common rhythm are some counterpointed, +some not. + +Common English rhythm, called Running Rhythm +above, is measured by feet of either two or three +syllables and (putting aside the imperfect feet at the +beginning and end of lines and also some unusual +measures, in which feet seem to be paired together and +double or composite feet to arise) never more or less. + +Every foot has one principal stress or accent, and +this or the syllable it falls on may be called the Stress +of the foot and the other part, the one or two unaccented +syllables, the Slack. Feet (and the rhythms made out +of them) in which the stress comes first are called +Falling Feet and Falling Rhythms, feet and rhythm +in which the slack comes first are called Rising Feet +and Rhythms, and if the stress is between two slacks +there will be Rocking Feet and Rhythms. These +distinctions are real and true to nature; but for purposes +of scanning it is a great convenience to follow the +(2) example of music and take the stress always first, as +the accent or the chief accent always comes first in +a musical bar. If this is done there will be in common +English verse only two possible feet--the so-called +accentual Trochee and Dactyl, and correspondingly +only two possible uniform rhythms, the so-called +Trochaic and Dactylic. But they may be mixed and then +what the Greeks called a Logaoedic Rhythm arises. +These are the facts and according to these the scanning +of ordinary regularly-written English verse is very +simple indeed and to bring in other principles is here +unnecessary. + +But because verse written strictly in these feet and +by these principles will become same and tame the +poets have brought in licences and departures from +rule to give variety, and especially when the natural +rhythm is rising, as in the common ten-syllable or +five-foot verse, rhymed or blank. These irregularities +are chiefly Reversed Feet and Reversed or Counterpoint +Rhythm, which two things are two steps or degrees +of licence in the same kind. By a reversed foot +I mean the putting the stress where, to judge by +the rest of the measure, the slack should be and the +slack where the stress, and this is done freely at the +beginning of a line and, in the course of a line, after +a pause; only scarcely ever in the second foot or +place and never in the last, unless when the poet +designs some extraordinary effect; for these places are +characteristic and sensitive and cannot well be touched. +But the reversal of the first foot and of some middle +(3) foot after a strong pause is a thing so natural that +our poets have generally done it, from Chaucer down, +without remark and it commonly passes unnoticed and +cannot be said to amount to a formal change of rhythm, +but rather is that irregularity which all natural growth +and motion shews. If however the reversal is repeated +in two feet running, especially so as to include the +sensitive second foot, it must be due either to great +want of ear or else is a calculated effect, the super- +inducing or mounting of a new rhythm upon the old; +and since the new or mounted rhythm is actually heard +and at the same time the mind naturally supplies the +natural or standard foregoing rhythm, for we do not +forget what the rhythm is that by rights we should be +hearing, two rhythms are in some manner running at +once and we have something answerable to counter- +point in music, which is two or more strains of tune +going on together, and this is Counterpoint Rhythm. +Of this kind of verse Milton is the great master and +the choruses of _Samson Agonistes_ are written throughout +in it--but with the disadvantage that he does not let +the reader clearly know what the ground-rhythm is +meant to be and so they have struck most readers as +merely irregular. And in fact if you counterpoint +throughout, since one only of the counter rhythms is +actually heard, the other is really destroyed or cannot +come to exist, and what is written is one rhythm only +and probably Sprung Rhythm, of which I now speak. + +Sprung Rhythm, as used in this book, is measured +by feet of from one to four syllables, regularly, and for +(4) particular effects any number of weak or slack syllables +may be used. It has one stress, which falls on the +only syllable, if there is only one, or, if there are more, +then scanning as above, on the first, and so gives rise to +four sorts of feet, a monosyllable and the so-called +accentual Trochee, Dactyl, and the First Paeon. And +there will be four corresponding natural rhythms; but +nominally the feet are mixed and any one may follow +any other. And hence Sprung Rhythm differs from +Running Rhythm in having or being only one nominal +rhythm, a mixed or 'logaoedic' one, instead of three, +but on the other hand in having twice the flexibility of +foot, so that any two stresses may either follow one +another running or be divided by one, two, or three +slack syllables. But strict Sprung Rhythm cannot be +counterpointed. In Sprung Rhythm, as in logaoedic +rhythm generally, the feet are assumed to be equally +long or strong and their seeming inequality is made up +by pause or stressing. + +Remark also that it is natural in Sprung Rhythm for +the lines to be _rove over_, that is for the scanning of +each line immediately to take up that of the one before, +so that if the first has one or more syllables at its end +the other must have so many the less at its beginning; +and in fact the scanning runs on without break from +the beginning, say, of a stanza to the end and all the +stanza is one long strain, though written in lines asunder. + +Two licences are natural to Sprung Rhythm. The +one is rests, as in music; but of this an example is +scarcely to be found in this book, unless in the _Echos_, +(5) second line. The other is _hangers_ or _outrides_ that +is one, two, or three slack syllables added to a foot and +not counting in the nominal scanning. They are so +called because they seem to hang below the line or +ride forward or backward from it in another dimension +than the line itself, according to a principle needless to +explain here. These outriding half feet or hangers are +marked by a loop underneath them, and plenty of them +will be found. + +The other marks are easily understood, namely +accents, where the reader might be in doubt which +syllable should have the stress; slurs, that is loops +_over_ syllables, to tie them together into the time of +one; little loops at the end of a line to shew that the +rhyme goes on to the first letter of the next line; +what in music are called pauses, to shew that the +syllable should be dwelt on; and twirls, to mark +reversed or counterpointed rhythm. + +Note on the nature and history of Sprung Rhythm-- +Sprung Rhythm is the most natural of things. For +(1) it is the rhythm of common speech and of written +prose, when rhythm is perceived in them. (2) It is the +rhythm of all but the most monotonously regular music, +so that in the words of choruses and refrains and in +songs written closely to music it arises. (3) It is +found in nursery rhymes, weather saws, and so on; +because, however these may have been once made in +running rhythm, the terminations having dropped off by +the change of language, the stresses come together and +so the rhythm is sprung. (4) It arises in common +(6) verse when reversed or counterpointed, for the same +reason. + +But nevertheless in spite of all this and though Greek +and Latin lyric verse, which is well known, and the old +English verse seen in _Pierce Ploughman_ are in sprung +rhythm, it has in fact ceased to be used since the +Elizabethan age, Greene being the last writer who can +be said to have recognised it. For perhaps there was +not, down to our days, a single, even short, poem in +English in which sprung rhythm is employed not for +single effects or in fixed places but as the governing +principle of the scansion. I say this because the +contrary has been asserted: if it is otherwise the poem +should be cited. + + +Some of the sonnets in this book* (*See previous note.) +are in five-foot, some in six-foot or Alexandrine lines. + +Nos. 13 and 22 are Curtal-Sonnets, that is they are +constructed in proportions resembling those of the +sonnet proper, namely 6 + 4 instead of 8 + 6, with +however a halfline tailpiece (so that the equation is +rather 12/8 + 9/2 = 21/2 + 10 1/2). + + + +(7) +_EARLY POEMS_ + + +_1 +For a Picture of +St. Dorothea_ + +I BEAR a basket lined with grass; +I am so light, I am so fair, +That men must wonder as I pass +And at the basket that I bear, +Where in a newly-drawn green litter +Sweet flowers I carry,--sweets for bitter. + +Lilies I shew you, lilies none, +None in Caesar's gardens blow,-- +And a quince in hand,--not one +Is set upon your boughs below; +Not set, because their buds not spring; +Spring not, 'cause world is wintering. + +But these were found in the East and South +Where Winter is the clime forgot.-- +The dewdrop on the larkspur's mouth +O should it then be quenched not? +In starry water-meads they drew +These drops: which be they? stars or dew? + +Had she a quince in hand? Yet gaze: +Rather it is the sizing moon. +Lo, linked heavens with milky ways! +That was her larkspur row.--So soon? +Sphered so fast, sweet soul?--We see +Nor fruit, nor flowers, nor Dorothy. + + +_2 +Heaven--Haven +A nun takes the veil_ + + I HAVE desired to go + Where springs not fail, +To fields where flies no sharp and sided hail + And a few lilies blow. + + And I have asked to be + Where no storms come, +Where the green swell is in the havens dumb, + And out of the swing of the sea. + +_3 +The Habit of Perfection_ + +ELECTED Silence, sing to me +And beat upon my whorled ear, +Pipe me to pastures still and be +The music that I care to hear. + +Shape nothing, lips; be lovely-dumb: +It is the shut, the curfew sent +From there where all surrenders come +Which only makes you eloquent. + +Be shelled, eyes, with double dark +And find the uncreated light: +This ruck and reel which you remark +Coils, keeps, and teases simple sight. + +Palate, the hutch of tasty lust, +Desire not to be rinsed with wine: +The can must be so sweet, the crust +So fresh that come in fasts divine! + +Nostrils, your careless breath that spend +Upon the stir and keep of pride, +What relish shall the censers send +Along the sanctuary side! + +O feel-of-primrose hands, O feet +That want the yield of plushy sward, +But you shall walk the golden street +And you unhouse and house the Lord. + +And, Poverty, be thou the bride +And now the marriage feast begun, +And lily-coloured clothes provide +Your spouse not laboured-at nor spun. + + + +_POEMS 1876-1889_ + + + +_4 +THE WRECK +OF THE DEUTSCHLAND_ + + To the +happy memory of five Franciscan Nuns + exiles by the Falk Laws +drowned between midnight and morning of + Dec. 7th. 1875 + + +PART THE FIRST + +1 + Thou mastering me + God! giver of breath and bread; + World's strand, sway of the sea; + Lord of living and dead; + Thou hast bound bones and veins in me, fastened me flesh, + And after it almost unmade, what with dread, + Thy doing: and dost thou touch me afresh? +Over again I feel thy finger and find thee. + +2 + I did say yes + O at lightning and lashed rod; + Thou heardst me truer than tongue confess + Thy terror, O Christ, O God; + Thou knowest the walls, altar and hour and night: + The swoon of a heart that the sweep and the hurl of thee trod + Hard down with a horror of height: +And the midriff astrain with leaning of, laced with fire of stress. + +3 + The frown of his face + Before me, the hurtle of hell + Behind, where, where was a, where was a place? + I whirled out wings that spell + And fled with a fling of the heart to the heart of the Host. + My heart, but you were dovewinged, I can tell, + Carrier-witted, I am bold to boast, +To flash from the flame to the flame then, tower from the grace + to the grace. + +4 + I am soft sift + In an hourglass--at the wall + Fast, but mined with a motion, a drift, + And it crowds and it combs to the fall; + I steady as a water in a well, to a poise, to a pane, + But roped with, always, all the way down from the tall + Fells or flanks of the voel, a vein +Of the gospel proffer, a pressure, a principle, Christ's gift. + +5 + I kiss my hand + To the stars, lovely-asunder + Starlight, wafting him out of it; and + Glow, glory in thunder; + Kiss my hand to the dappled-with-damson west: + Since, tho' he is under the world's splendour and wonder, + His mystery must be instressed, stressed; +For I greet him the days I meet him, and bless when I understand. + +6 + Not out of his bliss + Springs the stress felt + Nor first from heaven (and few know this) + Swings the stroke dealt-- + Stroke and a stress that stars and storms deliver, + That guilt is hushed by, hearts are flushed by and melt-- + But it rides time like riding a river +(And here the faithful waver, the faithless fable and miss), + +7 + It dates from day + Of his going in Galilee; + Warm-laid grave of a womb-life grey; + Manger, maiden's knee; + The dense and the driven Passion, and frightful sweat; + Thence the discharge of it, there its swelling to be, + Though felt before, though in high flood yet-- +What none would have known of it, only the heart, being hard at bay, + +8 + Is out with it! Oh, + We lash with the best or worst + Word last! How a lush-kept plush-capped sloe + Will, mouthed to flesh-burst, + Gush!--flush the man, the being with it, sour or sweet, + Brim, in a flash, full!--Hither then, last or first, + To hero of Calvary, Christ,'s feet-- +Never ask if meaning it, wanting it, warned of it--men go. + +9 + Be adored among men, + God, three-numbered form; + Wring thy rebel, dogged in den, + Man's malice, with wrecking and storm. + Beyond saying sweet, past telling of tongue, + Thou art lightning and love, I found it, a winter and warm; + Father and fondler of heart thou hast wrung: +Hast thy dark descending and most art merciful then. + +10 + With an anvil-ding + And with fire in him forge thy will + Or rather, rather then, stealing as Spring + Through him, melt him but master him still: + Whether at once, as once at a crash Paul, + Or as Austin, a lingering-out sweet skill, + Make mercy in all of us, out of us all +Mastery, but be adored, but be adored King. + + +_PART THE SECOND_ + +11 + 'Some find me a sword; some + The flange and the rail; flame, + Fang, or flood' goes Death on drum, + And storms bugle his fame. + But we dream we are rooted in earth--Dust! + Flesh falls within sight of us, we, though our flower the same, + Wave with the meadow, forget that there must +The sour scythe cringe, and the blear share come. + +12 + On Saturday sailed from Bremen, + American-outward-bound, + Take settler and seamen, tell men with women, + Two hundred souls in the round-- + O Father, not under thy feathers nor ever as guessing + The goal was a shoal, of a fourth the doom to be drowned; + Yet did the dark side of the bay of thy blessing +Not vault them, the million of rounds of thy mercy not reeve + even them in? + +13 + Into the snows she sweeps, + Hurling the haven behind, + The Deutschland, on Sunday; and so the sky keeps, + For the infinite air is unkind, + And the sea flint-flake, black-backed in the regular blow, + Sitting Eastnortheast, in cursed quarter, the wind; + Wiry and white-fiery and whirlwind-swivelled snow +Spins to the widow-making unchilding unfathering deeps. + +14 + She drove in the dark to leeward, + She struck--not a reef or a rock + But the combs of a smother of sand: night drew her + Dead to the Kentish Knock; + And she beat the bank down with her bows and the ride of + her keel: + The breakers rolled on her beam with ruinous shock; + And canvas and compass, the whorl and the wheel +Idle for ever to waft her or wind her with, these she endured. + +15 + Hope had grown grey hairs, + Hope had mourning on, + Trenched with tears, carved with cares, + Hope was twelve hours gone; + And frightful a nightfall folded rueful a day + Nor rescue, only rocket and lightship, shone, + And lives at last were washing away: +To the shrouds they took,--they shook in the hurling and + horrible airs. + +16 + One stirred from the rigging to save + The wild woman-kind below, + With a rope's end round the man, handy and brave-- + He was pitched to his death at a blow, + For all his dreadnought breast and braids of thew: + They could tell him for hours, dandled the to and fro + Through the cobbled foam-fleece, what could he do +With the burl of the fountains of air, buck and the flood of the wave? + +17 + They fought with God's cold-- + And they could not and fell to the deck + (Crushed them) or water (and drowned them) or rolled + With the sea-romp over the wreck. + Night roared, with the heart-break hearing a heart-broke rabble, + The woman's wailing, the crying of child without check-- + Till a lioness arose breasting the babble, +A prophetess towered in the tumult, a virginal tongue told. + +18 + Ah, touched in your bower of bone + Are you! turned for an exquisite smart, + Have you! make words break from me here all alone, + Do you!--mother of being in me, heart. + O unteachably after evil, but uttering truth, + Why, tears! is it? tears; such a melting, a madrigal start! + Never-eldering revel and river of youth, +What can it be, this glee? the good you have there of your own? + +19 + Sister, a sister calling + A master, her master and mine!-- + And the inboard seas run swirling and bawling; + The rash smart sloggering brine + Blinds her; but she that weather sees one thing, one; + Has one fetch in her: she rears herself to divine + Ears, and the call of the tall nun +To the men in the tops and the tackle rode over the storm's brawling. + +20 + She was first of a five and came + Of a coifed sisterhood. + (O Deutschland, double a desperate name! + O world wide of its good! + But Gertrude, lily, and Luther, are two of a town, + Christ's lily and beast of the waste wood: + From life's dawn it is drawn down, +Abel is Cain's brother and breasts they have sucked the same.) + +21 + Loathed for a love men knew in them, + Banned by the land of their birth, + Rhine refused them. Thames would ruin them; + Surf, snow, river and earth + Gnashed: but thou art above, thou Orion of light; + Thy unchancelling poising palms were weighing the worth, + Thou martyr-master: in thy sight +Storm flakes were scroll-leaved flowers, lily showers--sweet + heaven was astrew in them. + +22 + Five! the finding and sake + And cipher of suffering Christ. + Mark, the mark is of man's make + And the word of it Sacrificed. + But he scores it in scarlet himself on his own bespoken, + Before-time-taken, dearest prized and priced-- + Stigma, signal, cinquefoil token +For lettering of the lamb's fleece, ruddying of the rose-flake. + +23 + Joy fall to thee, father Francis, + Drawn to the Life that died; + With the gnarls of the nails in thee, niche of the lance, his + Lovescape crucified + And seal of his seraph-arrival! and these thy daughters + And five-lived and leaved favour and pride, + Are sisterly sealed in wild waters, +To bathe in his fall-gold mercies, to breathe in his all-fire glances. + +24 + Away in the loveable west, + On a pastoral forehead of Wales, + I was under a roof here, I was at rest, + And they the prey of the gales; + She to the black-about air, to the breaker, the thickly + Falling flakes, to the throng that catches and quails, + Was calling 'O Christ, Christ come quickly': +The cross to her she calls Christ to her, christens her wild-worn Best. + +25 + The majesty! what did she mean? + Breathe, arch and original Breath. + Is it love in her of the being as her lover had been? + Breathe, body of lovely Death. + They were else-minded then, altogether, the men + Woke thee with a _we are perishlng_ in the weather of Gennesareth. + Or is it that she cried for the crown then, +The keener to come at the comfort for feeling the combating keen? + +26 + For how to the heart's cheering + The down-dogged ground-hugged grey + Hovers off, the jay-blue heavens appearing + Of pied and peeled May! + Blue-beating and hoary-glow height; or night, still higher, + With belled fire and the moth-soft Milky Way, + What by your measure is the heaven of desire, +The treasure never eyesight got, nor was ever guessed what for + the hearing? + +27 + No, but it was not these. + The jading and jar of the cart, + Time's tasking, it is fathers that asking for ease + Of the sodden-with-its-sorrowing heart, + Not danger, electrical horror; then further it finds + The appealing of the Passion is tenderer in prayer apart: + Other, I gather, in measure her mind's +Burden, in wind's burly and beat of endragoned seas. + +28 + But how shall I ... make me room there; + Reach me a ... Fancy, come faster-- + Strike you the sight of it? look at it loom there, + Thing that she ... there then! the Master, + _Ipse_, the only one, Christ, King, Head: + He was to cure the extremity where he had cast her; + Do, deal, lord it with living and dead; +Let him ride, her pride, in his triumph, despatch and have done + with his doom there. + +29 + Ah! there was a heart right! + There was single eye! + Read the unshapeable shock night + And knew the who and the why; + Wording it how but by him that present and past, + Heaven and earth are word of, worded by?-- + The Simon Peter of a soul! to the blast +Tarpeian-fast, but a blown beacon of light. + +30 + Jesu, heart's light, + Jesu, maid's son, + What was the feast followed the night + Thou hadst glory of this nun? + Feast of the one woman without stain. + For so conceived, so to conceive thee is done; + But here was heart-throe, birth of a brain, +Word, that heard and kept thee and uttered thee outright. + +31 + Well, she has thee for the pain, for the + Patience; but pity of the rest of them! + Heart, go and bleed at a bitterer vein for the + Comfortless unconfessed of them-- + No not uncomforted: lovely-felicitous Providence + Finger of a tender of, O of a feathery delicacy, the breast of the + Maiden could obey so, be a bell to, ring of it, and +Startle the poor sheep back! is the shipwrack then a harvest; does + tempest carry the grain for thee? + +32 + I admire thce, master of the tides, + Of the Yore-flood, of the year's fall; + The recurb and the recovery of the gulfs sides, + The girth of it and the wharf of it and the wall; + Stanching, quenching ocean of a motionable mind; + Ground of being, and granite of it: past all + Grasp God, throned behind +Death with a sovereignty that heeds but hides, bodes but abides; + +33 + With a mercy that outrides + The all of water, an ark + For the listener; for the lingerer with a love glides + Lower than death and the dark; + A vein for the visiting of the past-prayer, pent in prison, + The-last-breath penitent spirits--the uttermost mark + Our passion-plunged giant risen, +The Christ of the Father compassionate, fetched in the storm of + his strides. + +34 + Now burn, new born to the world, + Doubled-natured name, + The heaven-flung, heart-fleshed, maiden-furled + Miracle-in-Mary-of-flame, + Mid-numbered He in three of the thunder-throne! + Not a dooms-day dazzle in his coming nor dark as he came; + Kind, but royally reclaiming his own; +A released shower, let flash to the shire, not a lightning of fire + hard-hurled. + +35 + Dame, at our door + Drowned, and among our shoals, + Remember us in the roads, the heaven-haven of the + Reward: + Our King back, oh, upon English souls! + Let him easter in us, be a dayspring to the dimness of us, + be a crimson-cresseted east, + More brightening her, rare-dear Britain, as his reign rolls, + Pride, rose, prince, hero of us, high-priest, +Our hearts' charity's hearth's fire, our thoughts' chivalry's throng's + Lord. + + +_5 +Penmaen Pool_ + +_For the Visitors' Book at the Inn_ + +WHO long for rest, who look for pleasure +Away from counter, court, or school +O where live well your lease of leisure +But here at, here at Penmaen Pool? + +You'll dare the Alp? you'll dart the skiff?-- +Each sport has here its tackle and tool: +Come, plant the staff by Cadair cliff; +Come, swing the sculls on Penmaen Pool. + +What's yonder?--Grizzled Dyphwys dim: +The triple-hummocked Giant's stool, +Hoar messmate, hobs and nobs with him +To halve the bowl of Penmaen Pool. + +And all the landscape under survey, +At tranquil turns, by nature's rule, +Rides repeated topsyturvy +In frank, in fairy Penmaen Pool. + +And Charles's Wain, the wondrous seven, +And sheep-flock clouds like worlds of wool. +For all they shine so, high in heaven, +Shew brighter shaken in Penmaen Pool. + +The Mawddach, how she trips! though throttled +If floodtide teeming thrills her full, +And mazy sands all water-wattled +Waylay her at ebb, past Penmaen Pool. + +But what 's to see in stormy weather, +When grey showers gather and gusts are cool?-- +Why, raindrop-roundels looped together +That lace the face of Penmaen Pool. + +Then even in weariest wintry hour +Of New Year's month or surly Yule +Furred snows, charged tuft above tuft, tower +From darksome darksome Penmaen Pool. + +And ever, if bound here hardest home, +You've parlour-pastime left and (who'll +Not honour it?) ale like goldy foam +That frocks an oar in Penmaen Pool. + +Then come who pine for peace or pleasure +Away from counter, court, or school, +Spend here your measure of time and treasure +And taste the treats of Penmaen Pool. + +_6 +The Silver Jubilee: +To James First Bishop of Shrewsbury on the 25th Year +of his Episcopate July 28. 1876_ + +1 +THOUGH no high-hung bells or din +Of braggart bugles cry it in-- + What is sound? Nature's round +Makes the Silver Jubilee. + +2 +Five and twenty years have run +Since sacred fountains to the sun + Sprang, that but now were shut, +Showering Silver Jubilee. + +3 +Feasts, when we shall fall asleep, +Shrewsbury may see others keep; + None but you this her true, +This her Silver Jubilee. + +4 +Not today we need lament +Your wealth of life is some way spent: + Toil has shed round your head +Silver but for Jubilee. + +5 +Then for her whose velvet vales +Should have pealed with welcome, Wales, + Let the chime of a rhyme +Utter Silver Jubilee. + + +_7 +God's Grandeur_ + +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. + + +_8 +The Starlight Night_ + +LOOK at the stars! look, look up at the skies! + O look at all the fire-folk sitting in the air! + The bright boroughs, the circle-citadels there! +Down in dim woods the diamond delves! the elves'-eyes! +The grey lawns cold where gold, where quickgold lies! + Wind-beat whitebeam! airy abeles set on a flare! + Flake-doves sent floating forth at a farmyard scare!-- +Ah well! it is all a purchase, all is a prize. + +Buy then! bid then!--What?--Prayer, patience, alms, + vows. +Look, look: a May-mess, like on orchard boughs! + Look! March-bloom, like on mealed-with-yellow + sallows! +These are indeed the barn; withindoors house +The shocks. This piece-bright paling shuts the spouse + Christ home, Christ and his mother and all his hallows. + + +_9 +Spring_ + +NOTHING is so beautiful as spring-- + When weeds, in wheels, shoot long and lovely and lush; + Thrush's eggs look little low heavens, and thrush +Through the echoing timber does so rinse and wring +The ear, it strikes like lightnings to hear him sing; + The glassy peartree leaves and blooms, they brush + The descending blue; that blue is all in a rush +With richness; the racing lambs too have fair their fling. + +What is all this juice and all this joy? + A strain of the earth's sweet being in the beginning +In Eden garden. Have, get, before it cloy, + Before it cloud, Christ, lord, and sour with sinning, +Innocent mind and Mayday in girl and boy, + Most, O maid's child, thy choice and worthy the + winning. + + +_10 +The Lantern out of Doors_ + +SOMETIMES a lantern moves along the night, + That interests our eyes. And who goes there? + I think; where from and bound, I wonder, where, +With, all down darkness wide, his wading light? + +Men go by me whom either beauty bright + In mould or mind or what not else makes rare: + They rain against our much-thick and marsh air +Rich beams, till death or distance buys them quite. + +Death or distance soon consumes them: wind + What most I may eye after, be in at the end +I cannot, and out of sight is out of mind. + +Christ minds: Christ's interest, what to avow or amend + There, eyes them, heart wants, care haunts, foot + follows kind, +Their ransom, their rescue, and first, fast, last friend. + + +_11 +The Sea and the Skylark_ + +ON ear and ear two noises too old to end + Trench--right, the tide that ramps against the shore; + With a flood or a fall, low lull-off or all roar, +Frequenting there while moon shall wear and wend. + +Left hand, off land, I hear the lark ascend, + His rash-fresh re-winded new-skeined score + In crisps of curl off wild winch whirl, and pour +And pelt music, till none's to spill nor spend. + +How these two shame this shallow and frail town! + How ring right out our sordid turbid time, +Being pure! We, life's pride and cared-for crown, + + Have lost that cheer and charm of earth's past prime: +Our make and making break, are breaking, down + To man's last dust, drain fast towards man's first slime. + + +_12 +The Windhover: + +To Christ our Lord_ + +I CAUGHT this morning morning's minion, king- + dom of daylight's dauphin, dapple-dawn-drawn Fal- + con, in his riding +Of the rolling level underneath him steady air, and + striding +High there, how he rung upon the rein of a wimpling wing +In his ecstacy! then off, off forth on swing, + As a skate's heel sweeps smooth on a bow-bend: + the hurl and gliding + Rebuffed the big wind. My heart in hiding +Stirred for a bird,--the achieve of, the mastery of the + thing! + +Brute beauty and valour and act, oh, air, pride, plume, here + Buckle! AND the fire that breaks from thee then, a + billion +Times told lovelier, more dangerous, O my chevalier! + + No wonder of it: sheer plod makes plough down + sillion +Shine, and blue-bleak embers, ah my dear, + Fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermillion. + + +_13 +Pied Beauty_ + +GLORY be to God for dappled things-- + For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow; + For rose-moles all 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, original, spare, 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. + + +_14 +Hurrahing in Harvest_ + +SUMMER ends now; now, barbarous in beauty, the + stooks rise + Around; up above, what wind-walks! what lovely + behaviour + Of silk-sack clouds! has wilder, wilful-wavier +Meal-drift moulded ever and melted across skies? + +I walk, I lift up, I lift up heart, eyes, + Down all that glory in the heavens to glean our + Saviour; + And, eyes, heart, what looks, what lips yet gave you a +Rapturous love's greeting of realer, of rounder replies? + +And the azurous hung hills are his world-wielding + shoulder + Majestic--as a stallion stalwart, very-violet-sweet!-- +These things, these things were here and but the + beholder + Wanting; which two when they once meet, +The heart rears wings bold and bolder + And hurls for him, O half hurls earth for him off + under his feet. + + +_15 +Caged Skylark_ + +As a dare-gale skylark scanted in a dull cage + Man's mounting spirit in his bone-house, mean house, + dwells-- + That bird beyond the remembering his free fells; +This in drudgery, day-labouring-out life's age. + +Though aloft on turf or perch or poor low stage, + Both sing sometimes the sweetest, sweetest spells, + Yet both droop deadly sometimes in their cells +Or wring their barriers in bursts of fear or rage. + +Not that the sweet-fowl, song-fowl, needs no rest-- +Why, hear him, hear him babble and drop down to his nest, + But his own nest, wild nest, no prison. + +Man's spirit will be flesh-bound when found at best, +But uncumbered: meadow-down is not distressed + For a rainbow footing it nor he for his bones risen. + + +_16 +In the Valley of the Elwy_ + +I REMEMBER a house where all were good + To me, God knows, deserving no such thing: + Comforting smell breathed at very entering, +Fetched fresh, as I suppose, off some sweet wood. +That cordial air made those kind people a hood + All over, as a bevy of eggs the mothering wing + Will, or mild nights the new morsels of spring: +Why, it seemed of course; seemed of right it should. + +Lovely the woods, waters, meadows, combes, vales, +All the air things wear that build this world of Wales; + Only the inmate does not correspond: +God, lover of souls, swaying considerate scales, +Complete thy creature dear O where it fails, + Being mighty a master, being a father and fond. + + +_17 +The Loss of the Eurydice + +Foundered March 24. 1878_ + +1 +THE Eurydice--it concerned thee, O Lord: +Three hundred souls, O alas! on board, + Some asleep unawakened, all un- +warned, eleven fathoms fallen + +2 +Where she foundered! One stroke +Felled and furled them, the hearts of oak! + And flockbells off the aerial +Downs' forefalls beat to the burial. + +3 +For did she pride her, freighted fully, on +Bounden bales or a hoard of bullion?-- + Precious passing measure, +Lads and men her lade and treasure. + +4 +She had come from a cruise, training seamen-- +Men, boldboys soon to be men: + Must it, worst weather, +Blast bole and bloom together? + +5 +No Atlantic squall overwrought her +Or rearing billow of the Biscay water: + Home was hard at hand +And the blow bore from land. + +6 +And you were a liar, O blue March day. +Bright sun lanced fire in the heavenly bay; + But what black Boreas wrecked her? he +Came equipped, deadly-electric, + +7 +A beetling baldbright cloud thorough England +Riding: there did storms not mingle? and + Hailropes hustle and grind their +Heavengravel? wolfsnow, worlds of it, wind there? + +8 +Now Carisbrook keep goes under in gloom; +Now it overvaults Appledurcombe; + Now near by Ventnor town +It hurls, hurls off Boniface Down. + +9 +Too proud, too proud, what a press she bore! +Royal, and all her royals wore. + Sharp with her, shorten sail! +Too late; lost; gone with the gale. + +10 +This was that fell capsize, +As half she had righted and hoped to rise + Death teeming in by her portholes +Raced down decks, round messes of mortals. + +11 +Then a lurch forward, frigate and men; +'All hands for themselves' the cry ran then; + But she who had housed them thither +Was around them, bound them or wound them with her. + +12 +Marcus Hare, high her captain, +Kept to her--care-drowned and wrapped in + Cheer's death, would follow +His charge through the champ-white water-in-a-wallow. + +13 +All under Channel to bury in a beach her +Cheeks: Right, rude of feature, + He thought he heard say +'Her commander! and thou too, and thou this way.' + +14 +It is even seen, time's something server, +In mankind's medley a duty-swerver, + At downright 'No or yes?' +Doffs all, drives full for righteousness. + +15 +Sydney Fletcher, Bristol-bred, +(Low lie his mates now on watery bed) + Takes to the seas and snows +As sheer down the ship goes. + +16 +Now her afterdraught gullies him too down; +Now he wrings for breath with the deathgush brown; + Till a lifebelt and God's will +Lend him a lift from the sea-swill. + +17 +Now he shoots short up to the round air; +Now he gasps, now he gazes everywhere; + But his eye no cliff, no coast or +Mark makes in the rivelling snowstorm. + +18 +Him, after an hour of wintry waves, +A schooner sights, with another, and saves, + And he boards her in Oh! such joy +He has lost count what came next, poor boy.-- + +19 +They say who saw one sea-corpse cold +He was all of lovely manly mould, + Every inch a tar, +Of the best we boast our sailors are. + +20 +Look, foot to forelock, how all things suit! he +Is strung by duty, is strained to beauty, + And brown-as-dawning-skinned +With brine and shine and whirling wind. + +21 +O his nimble finger, his gnarled grip! +Leagues, leagues of seamanship + Slumber in these forsaken +Bones, this sinew, and will not waken. + +22 +He was but one like thousands more, +Day and night I deplore + My people and born own nation, +Fast foundering own generation, + +23 +I might let bygones be--our curse +Of ruinous shrine no hand or, worse, + Robbery's hand is busy to +Dress, hoar-hallowed shrines unvisited; + +24 +Only the breathing temple and fleet +Life, this wildworth blown so sweet, + These daredeaths, ay this crew, in +Unchrist, all rolled in ruin-- + +25 +Deeply surely I need to deplore it, +Wondering why my master bore it, + The riving off that race +So at home, time was, to his truth and grace + +26 +That a starlight-wender of ours would say +The marvellous Milk was Walsingham Way + And one--but let be, let be: +More, more than was will yet be.-- + +27 +O well wept, mother have lost son; +Wept, wife; wept, sweetheart would be one: + Though grief yield them no good +Yet shed what tears sad truelove should. + +28 +But to Christ lord of thunder +Crouch; lay knee by earth low under: + 'Holiest, loveliest, bravest, +Save my hero, O Hero savest. + +29 +And the prayer thou hearst me making +Have, at the awful overtaking, + Heard; have heard and granted +Grace that day grace was wanted.' + +30 +Not that hell knows redeeming, +But for souls sunk in seeming + Fresh, till doomfire burn all, +Prayer shall fetch pity eternal. + + +_18 +The May Magnificat_ + +MAY is Mary's month, and I +Muse at that and wonder why: + Her feasts follow reason, + Dated due to season-- + +Candlemas, Lady Day; +But the Lady Month, May, + Why fasten that upon her, + With a feasting in her honour? + +Is it only its being brighter +Than the most are must delight her? + Is it opportunest + And flowers finds soonest? + +Ask of her, the mighty mother: +Her reply puts this other + Question: What is Spring?-- + Growth in every thing-- + +Flesh and fleece, fur and feather, +Grass and green world all together; + Star-eyed strawberry-breasted + Throstle above her nested + +Cluster of bugle blue eggs thin +Forms and warms the life within; + And bird and blossom swell + In sod or sheath or shell. + +All things rising, all things sizing +Mary sees, sympathising + With that world of good, + Nature's motherhood. + +Their magnifying of each its kind +With delight calls to mind + How she did in her stored + Magnify the Lord. + +Well but there was more than this: +Spring's universal bliss + Much, had much to say + To offering Mary May. + +When drop-of-blood-and-foam-dapple +Bloom lights the orchard-apple + And thicket and thorp are merry + With silver-surfed cherry + +And azuring-over greybell makes +Wood banks and brakes wash wet like lakes + And magic cuckoocall + Caps, clears, and clinches all-- + +This ecstacy all through mothering earth +Tells Mary her mirth till Christ's birth + To remember and exultation + In God who was her salvation. + + +_19 +Binsey Poplars + +felled 1879_ + +MY aspens dear, whose airy cages quelled, +Quelled or quenched in leaves the leaping sun, +All felled, felled, are all felled; + Of a fresh and following folded rank + Not spared, not one + That dandled a sandalled + Shadow that swam or sank +On meadow and river and wind-wandering weed-winding + bank. + +O if we but knew what we do + When we delve or hew-- +Hack and rack the growing green! + Since country is so tender +To touch, her being so slender, +That, like this sleek and seeing ball +But a prick will make no eye at all, +Where we, even where we mean + To mend her we end her, + When we hew or delve: +After-comers cannot guess the beauty been. + Ten or twelve, only ten or twelve + Strokes of havoc unselve + The sweet especial scene, + Rural scene, a rural scene, + Sweet especial rural scene. + + +_20 +Duns Scotus's Oxford_ + +TOWERY city and branchy between towers; +Cuckoo-echoing, bell-swarmed, lark-charmed, rook- + racked, river-rounded; +The dapple-eared lily below thee; that country and + town did +Once encounter in, here coped and poised powers; + +Thou hast a base and brickish skirt there, sours +That neighbour-nature thy grey beauty is grounded +Best in; graceless growth, thou hast confounded +Rural rural keeping--folk, flocks, and flowers. + +Yet ah! this air I gather and I release +He lived on; these weeds and waters, these walls are what +He haunted who of all men most sways my spirits to peace; + +Of realty the rarest-veined unraveller; a not +Rivalled insight, be rival Italy or Greece; +Who fired France for Mary without spot. + + +_21 +Henry Purcell_ + +_The poet wishes well to the divine genius of Purcell +and praises him that, whereas other musicians have given +utterance to the moods of man's mind, he has, beyond +that, uttered in notes the very make and species of man as +created both in him and in all men generally._ + +HAVE fair fallen, O fair, fair have fallen, so dear +To me, so arch-especial a spirit as heaves in Henry Purcell, +An age is now since passed, since parted; with the reversal +Of the outward sentence low lays him, listed to a heresy, + here. + +Not mood in him nor meaning, proud fire or sacred fear, +Or love or pity or all that sweet notes not his might nursle: +It is the forged feature finds me; it is the rehearsal +Of own, of abrupt self there so thrusts on, so throngs + the ear. + +Let him Oh! with his air of angels then lift me, lay me! + only I'll +Have an eye to the sakes of him, quaint moonmarks, to + his pelted plumage under +Wings: so some great stormfowl, whenever he has walked + his while + +The thunder-purple seabeach plume purple-of-thunder, +If a wuthering of his palmy snow-pinions scatter a + colossal smile +Off him, but meaning motion fans fresh our wits with + wonder. + + +_22 +Peace_ + +WHEN will you ever, Peace, wild wooddove, shy wings shut, +Your round me roaming end, and under be my boughs? +When, when, Peace, will you, Peace? I'll not play + hypocrite +To own my heart: I yield you do come sometimes; but +That piecemeal peace is poor peace. What pure peace + allows +Alarms of wars, the daunting wars, the death of it? + +O surely, reaving Peace, my Lord should leave in lieu +Some good! And so he does leave Patience exquisite, +That plumes to Peace thereafter. And when Peace here + does house +He comes with work to do, he does not come to coo, +He comes to brood and sit. + + +_23 +The Bugler's First Communion + +A BUGLER boy from barrack (it is over the hill +There)--boy bugler, born, he tells me, of Irish + Mother to an English sire (he +Shares their best gifts surely, fall how things will), + +This very very day came down to us after a boon he on +My late being there begged of me, overflowing + Boon in my bestowing, +Came, I say, this day to it--to a First Communion. + +Here he knelt then in regimental red. +Forth Christ from cupboard fetched, how fain I of feet + To his youngster take his treat! +Low-latched in leaf-light housel his too huge godhead. + +There! and your sweetest sendings, ah divine, +By it, heavens, befall him! as a heart Christ's darling, + dauntless; + Tongue true, vaunt- and tauntless; +Breathing bloom of a chastity in mansex fine. + +Frowning and forefending angel-warder +Squander the hell-rook ranks sally to molest him; + March, kind comrade, abreast him; +Dress his days to a dexterous and starlight order. + +How it does my heart good, visiting at that bleak hill, +When limber liquid youth, that to all I teach + Yields tender as a pushed peach, +Hies headstrong to its wellbeing of a self-wise self-will! + +Then though I should tread tufts of consolation +Days after, so I in a sort deserve to + And do serve God to serve to +Just such slips of soldiery Christ's royal ration. + +Nothing else is like it, no, not all so strains +Us: fresh youth fretted in a bloomfall all portending + That sweet's sweeter ending; +Realm both Christ is heir to and there reigns. + +O now well work that sealing sacred ointment! +O for now charms, arms, what bans off bad + And locks love ever in a lad! +Let me though see no more of him, and not disappointment + +Those sweet hopes quell whose least me quickenings lift. +In scarlet or somewhere of some day seeing + That brow and bead of being, +An our day's God's own Galahad. Though this child's + drift + +Seems by a divine doom channelled, nor do I cry +Disaster there; but may he not rankle and roam + In backwheels though bound home?-- +That left to the Lord of the Eucharist, I here lie by; + +Recorded only, I have put my lips on pleas +Would brandle adamantine heaven with ride and jar, did + Prayer go disregarded: +Forward-like, but however, and like favourable heaven + heard these. + + +_24 +Morning Midday and Evening Sacrifice_ + +THE dappled die-away +Cheek and wimpled lip, +The gold-wisp, the airy-grey +Eye, all in fellowship-- +This, all this beauty blooming, +This, all this freshness fuming, +Give God while worth consuming. + +Both thought and thew now bolder +And told by Nature: Tower; +Head, heart, hand, heel, and shoulder +That beat and breathe in power-- +This pride of prime's enjoyment +Take as for tool, not toy meant +And hold at Christ's employment. + +The vault and scope and schooling +And mastery in the mind, +In silk-ash kept from cooling, +And ripest under rind-- +What life half lifts the latch of, +What hell stalks towards the snatch of, +Your offering, with despatch, of! + +_25 +Andromeda_ + +Now Time's Andromeda on this rock rude, +With not her either beauty's equal or +Her injury's, looks off by both horns of shore, +Her flower, her piece of being, doomed dragon's food. + Time past she has been attempted and pursued +By many blows and banes; but now hears roar +A wilder beast from West than all were, more +Rife in her wrongs, more lawless, and more lewd. + + Her Perseus linger and leave her to her extremes?-- +Pillowy air he treads a time and hangs +His thoughts on her, forsaken that she seems, + All while her patience, morselled into pangs, +Mounts; then to alight disarming, no one dreams, +With Gorgon's gear and barebill, thongs and fangs. + + +_26 +The Candle Indoors_ + +SOME candle clear burns somewhere I come by. +I muse at how its being puts blissful back +With yellowy moisture mild night's blear-all black, +Or to-fro tender trambeams truckle at the eye. +By that window what task what fingers ply, +I plod wondering, a-wanting, just for lack +Of answer the eagerer a-wanting Jessy or Jack +There God to aggrandise, God to glorify.-- + +Come you indoors, come home; your fading fire +Mend first and vital candle in close heart's vault: +You there are master, do your own desire; +What hinders? Are you beam-blind, yet to a fault +In a neighbour deft-handed? Are you that liar +And cast by conscience out, spendsavour salt? + + +_27 +The Handsome Heart: + +at a Gracious Answer_ + +'BUT tell me, child, your choice; what shall I buy +You?'--'Father, what you buy me I like best.' +With the sweetest air that said, still plied and pressed, +He swung to his first poised purport of reply. + +What the heart is! which, like carriers let fly-- +Doff darkness, homing nature knows the rest-- +To its own fine function, wild and self-instressed, +Falls light as ten years long taught how to and why. + +Mannerly-hearted! more than handsome face-- +Beauty's bearing or muse of mounting vein, +All, in this case, bathed in high hallowing grace . . . + +Of heaven what boon to buy you, boy, or gain +Not granted?--Only ... O on that path you pace +Run all your race, O brace sterner that strain! + + +_28 + +At the Wedding March_ + +GOD with honour hang your head, +Groom, and grace you, bride, your bed +With lissome scions, sweet scions, +Out of hallowed bodies bred. + +Each be other's comfort kind: +Deep, deeper than divined, +Divine charity, dear charity, +Fast you ever, fast bind. + +Then let the March tread our ears: +I to him turn with tears +Who to wedlock, his wonder wedlock, +Deals triumph and immortal years. + + +_29 +Felix Randal_ + +FELIX RANDAL the farrier, O he is dead then? my duty all ended, +Who have watched his mould of man, big-boned and hardy- + handsome +Pining, pining, till time when reason rambled in it and some +Fatal four disorders, fleshed there, all contended? + +Sickness broke him. Impatient he cursed at first, but mended +Being anointed and all; though a heavenlier heart began some +Months earlier, since I had our sweet reprieve and ransom +Tendered to him. Ah well, God rest him all road ever he + offended! + +This seeing the sick endears them to us, us too it endears. +My tongue had taught thee comfort, touch had quenched thy tears, +Thy tears that touched my heart, child, Felix, poor Felix Randal; + +How far from then forethought of, all thy more boisterous years, +When thou at the random grim forge, powerful amidst peers, +Didst fettle for the great grey drayhorse his bright and battering + sandal! + + +_30 +Brothers_ + +How lovely the elder brother's +Life all laced in the other's, +Love-laced! what once I well +Witnessed; so fortune fell. +When Shrovetide, two years gone, 5 +Our boys' plays brought on +Part was picked for John, +Young John: then fear, then joy +Ran revel in the elder boy. +Their night was come now; all 10 +Our company thronged the hall; +Henry, by the wall, +Beckoned me beside him: +I came where called, and eyed him +By meanwhiles; making my play 15 +Turn most on tender byplay. +For, wrung all on love's rack, +My lad, and lost in Jack, +Smiled, blushed, and bit his lip; +Or drove, with a diver's dip, 20 +Clutched hands down through clasped knees-- +Truth's tokens tricks like these, +Old telltales, with what stress +He hung on the imp's success. +Now the other was brass-bold: 25 +He had no work to hold +His heart up at the strain; +Nay, roguish ran the vein. +Two tedious acts were past; +Jack's call and cue at last; 30 +When Henry, heart-forsook, +Dropped eyes and dared not look. +Eh, how all rung! +Young dog, he did give tongue! +But Harry--in his hands he has flung 35 +His tear-tricked cheeks of flame +For fond love and for shame. + Ah Nature, framed in fault, +There 's comfort then, there 's salt; +Nature, bad, base, and blind, 40 +Dearly thou canst be kind; +There dearly then, dearly, +I'll cry thou canst be kind. + + +_31 +Spring and Fall: + +to a young child_ + +MARGARET, are you grieving +Over Goldengrove unleaving? +Leaves, like the things of man, you +With your fresh thoughts care for, can you? +Ah! as the heart grows older +It will come to such sights colder +By and by, nor spare a sigh +Though worlds of wanwood leafmeal lie; +And yet you will weep and know why. +Now no matter, child, the name: +Sorrow's springs are the same. +Nor mouth had, no nor mind, expressed +What heart heard of, ghost guessed: +It is the blight man was born for, +It is Margaret you mourn for. + + +_32 +Spelt from Sibyl's Leaves_ + +EARNEST, earthless, equal, attuneable, | vaulty, voluminous, . . + stupendous +Evening strains to be time's vast, | womb-of-all, home-of-all, + hearse-of-all night. +Her fond yellow hornlight wound to the west, | her wild hollow + hoarlight hung to the height +Waste; her earliest stars, earl-stars, | stars principal, overbend us, +Fire-featuring heaven. For earth | her being has unbound, her + dapple is at an end, as- +tray or aswarm, all throughther, in throngs; | self in self steeped + and pashed--quite +Disremembering, dismembering | all now. Heart, you round me + right +With: Our evening is over us; our night | whelms, whelms, and + will end us. +Only the beak-leaved boughs dragonish | damask the tool-smooth + bleak light; black, +Ever so black on it. Our tale, our oracle! | Let life, waned, + ah let life wind +Off her once skeined stained veined variety | upon, all on two + spools; part, pen, pack +Now her all in two flocks, two folds--black, white; | right, + wrong; reckon but, reck but, mind +But these two; ware of a world where but these | two tell, each + off the other; of a rack +Where, selfwrung, selfstrung, sheathe- and shelterless, | thoughts + against thoughts in groans grind. + + +_33 +Inversnaid_ + +THIS darksome burn, horseback brown, +His rollrock highroad roaring down, +In coop and in comb the fleece of his foam +Flutes and low to the lake falls home. + +A windpuff-bonnet of faawn-froth +Turns and twindles over the broth +Of a pool so pitchblack, fell-frowning, +It rounds and rounds Despair to drowning. + +Degged with dew, dappled with dew +Are the groins of the braes that the brook treads through, +Wiry heathpacks, flitches of fern, +And the beadbonny ash that sits over the burn. + +What would the world be, once bereft +Of wet and of wildness? Let them be left, +O let them be left, wildness and wet; +Long live the weeds and the wilderness yet. + + +_34 + +As kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame; +As tumbled over rim in roundy wells +Stones ring; like each tucked string tells, each hung bell's +Bow swung finds tongue to fling out broad its name; +Each mortal thing does one thing and the same: +Deals out that being indoors each one dwells; +Selves--goes itself; _myself_ it speaks and spells, +Crying _What I do is me: for that I came._ + +I say more: the just man justices; +Keeps grace: that keeps all his goings graces; +Acts in God's eye what in God's eye he is-- +Christ--for Christ plays in ten thousand places, +Lovely in limbs, and lovely in eyes not his +To the Father through the features of men's faces. + + +_35 +Ribblesdale_ + +EARTH, sweet Earth, sweet landscape, with leaves throng +And louched low grass, heaven that dost appeal +To, with no tongue to plead, no heart to feel; +That canst but only be, but dost that long-- + +Thou canst but be, but that thou well dost; strong +Thy plea with him who dealt, nay does now deal, +Thy lovely dale down thus and thus bids reel +Thy river, and o'er gives all to rack or wrong. + + And what is Earth's eye, tongue, or heart else, where +Else, but in dear and dogged man?--Ah, the heir +To his own selfbent so bound, so tied to his turn, +To thriftless reave both our rich round world bare +And none reck of world after, this bids wear +Earth brows of such care, care and dear concern. + + +_36 +The Leaden Echo and the Golden Echo + +(Maidens' song from St. Winefred's Well)_ + +THE LEADEN ECHO + +How to keep--is there any any, is there none such, nowhere + known some, bow or brooch or braid or brace, lace, latch + or catch or key to keep +Back beauty, keep it, beauty, beauty, beauty, . . . from vanishing + away? + + O is there no frowning of these wrinkles, ranked wrinkles deep, +Down? no waving off of these most mournful messengers, still + messengers, sad and stealing messengers of grey? +No there's none, there's none, O no there's none, +Nor can you long be, what you now are, called fair, +Do what you may do, what, do what you may, +And wisdom is early to despair: +Be beginning; since, no, nothing can be done +To keep at bay +Age and age's evils, hoar hair, +Ruck and wrinkle, drooping, dying, death's worst, winding + sheets, tombs and worms and tumbling to decay; +So be beginning, be beginning to despair. +O there's none; no no no there's none: +Be beginning to despair, to despair, +Despair, despair, despair, despair. + + +THE GOLDEN ECHO + + Spare! +There is one, yes I have one (Hush there!); +Only not within seeing of the sun, +Not within the singeing of the strong sun, +Tall sun's tingeing, or treacherous the tainting of the earth's air. +Somewhere elsewhere there is ah well where! one, +One. Yes I can tell such a key, I do know such a place, +Where whatever's prized and passes of us, everything that's + fresh and fast flying of us, seems to us sweet of us and + swiftly away with, done away with, undone, +Undone, done with, soon done with, and yet dearly and + dangerously sweet +Of us, the wimpled-water-dimpled, not-by-morning-matched face, +The flower of beauty, fleece of beauty, too too apt to, ah! to fleet, +Never fleets more, fastened with the tenderest truth +To its own best being and its loveliness of youth: it is an ever- + lastingness of, O it is an all youth! +Come then, your ways and airs and looks, locks, maiden gear, + gallantry and gaiety and grace, +Winning ways, airs innocent, maiden manners, sweet looks, + loose locks, long locks, lovelocks, gaygear, going gallant, + girlgrace-- +Resign them, sign them, seal them, send them, motion them + with breath, +And with sighs soaring, soaring sighs deliver +Them; beauty-in-the-ghost, deliver it, early now, long before + death +Give beauty back, beauty, beauty, beauty, back to God, beauty's + self and beauty's giver. +See; not a hair is, not an eyelash, not the least lash lost; every hair +Is, hair of the head, numbered. +Nay, what we had lighthanded left in surly the mere mould +Will have waked and have waxed and have walked with the wind + what while we slept, +This side, that side hurling a heavyheaded hundredfold +What while we, while we slumbered. +O then, weary then why should we tread? O why are we so + haggard at the heart, so care-coiled, care-killed, so fagged, + so fashed, so cogged, so cumbered, +When the thing we freely forfeit is kept with fonder a care, +Fonder a care kept than we could have kept it, kept +Far with fonder a care (and we, we should have lost it) finer, fonder +A care kept. Where kept? Do but tell us where kept, where.-- +Yonder.--What high as that! We follow, now we follow.-- + Yonder, yes yonder, yonder, +Yonder. + + +_37 +The Blessed Virgin compared to the Air we +Breathe_ + +WILD air, world-mothering air, +Nestling me everywhere, +That each eyelash or hair +Girdles; goes home betwixt +The fleeciest, frailest-flixed +Snowflake; that's fairly mixed +With, riddles, and is rife +In every least thing's life; +This needful, never spent, +And nursing element; 10 +My more than meat and drink, +My meal at every wink; +This air, which, by life's law, +My lung must draw and draw +Now but to breathe its praise, +Minds me in many ways +Of her who not only +Gave God's infinity +Dwindled to infancy +Welcome in womb and breast, 20 +Birth, milk, and all the rest +But mothers each new grace +That does now reach our race-- +Mary Immaculate, +Merely a woman, yet +Whose presence, power is +Great as no goddess's +Was deemed, dreamed; who +This one work has to do-- +Let all God's glory through, 30 +God's glory which would go +Through her and from her flow +Off, and no way but so. + + I say that we are wound +With mercy round and round +As if with air: the same +Is Mary, more by name. +She, wild web, wondrous robe, +Mantles the guilty globe, +Since God has let dispense 40 +Her prayers his providence: +Nay, more than almoner, +The sweet alms' self is her +And men are meant to share +Her life as life does air. + If I have understood, +She holds high motherhood +Towards all our ghostly good +And plays in grace her part +About man's beating heart, 50 +Laying, like air's fine flood, +The deathdance in his blood; +Yet no part but what will +Be Christ our Saviour still. +Of her flesh he took flesh: +He does take fresh and fresh, +Though much the mystery how, +Not flesh but spirit now +And makes, O marvellous! +New Nazareths in us, 60 +Where she shall yet conceive +Him, morning, noon, and eve; +New Bethlems, and he born +There, evening, noon, and morn +Bethlem or Nazareth, +Men here may draw like breath +More Christ and baffle death; +Who, born so, comes to be +New self and nobler me +In each one and each one 70 +More makes, when all is done, +Both God's and Mary's Son. + Again, look overhead +How air is azured; +O how! nay do but stand +Where you can lift your hand +Skywards: rich, rich it laps +Round the four fingergaps. +Yet such a sapphire-shot, +Charged, steeped sky will not 80 +Stain light. Yea, mark you this: +It does no prejudice. +The glass-blue days are those +When every colour glows, +Each shape and shadow shows. +Blue be it: this blue heaven +The seven or seven times seven +Hued sunbeam will transmit +Perfect, not alter it. +Or if there does some soft, 90 +On things aloof, aloft, +Bloom breathe, that one breath more +Earth is the fairer for. +Whereas did air not make +This bath of blue and slake +His fire, the sun would shake, +A blear and blinding ball +With blackness bound, and all +The thick stars round him roll +Flashing like flecks of coal, 100 +Quartz-fret, or sparks of salt, +In grimy vasty vault. + So God was god of old: +A mother came to mould +Those limbs like ours which are +What must make our daystar +Much dearer to mankind; +Whose glory bare would blind +Or less would win man's mind. +Through her we may see him 110 +Made sweeter, not made dim, +And her hand leaves his light +Sifted to suit our sight. + Be thou then, thou dear +Mother, my atmosphere; +My happier world, wherein +To wend and meet no sin; +Above me, round me lie +Fronting my froward eye +With sweet and scarless sky; 120 +Stir in my ears, speak there +Of God's love, O live air, +Of patience, penance, prayer: +World-mothering air, air wild, +Wound with thee, in thee isled, +Fold home, fast fold thy child. + + +_38 +To what serves Mortal Beauty?_ + +To what serves mortal beauty | dangerous; does set danc- +ing blood the O-seal-that-so | feature, flung prouder form +Than Purcell tune lets tread to? | See: it does this: keeps warm +Men's wits to the things that are; | what good means--where a glance +Master more may than gaze, | gaze out of countenance. +Those lovely lads once, wet-fresh | windfalls of war's storm, +How then should Gregory, a father, | have gleaned else from swarm- +ed Rome? But God to a nation | dealt that day's dear chance. + To man, that needs would worship | block or barren stone, +Our law says: Love what are | love's worthiest, were all known; +World's loveliest--men's selves. Self | flashes off frame and face. +What do then? how meet beauty? | Merely meet it; own, +Home at heart, heaven's sweet gift; | then leave, let that alone. +Yea, wish that though, wish all, | God's better beauty, grace. + + +_39 +(The Soldier)_ + +YES. Why do we all, seeing of a soldier, bless him? bless +Our redcoats, our tars? Both these being, the greater part, +But frail clay, nay but foul clay. Here it is: the heart, +Since, proud, it calls the calling manly, gives a guess +That, hopes that, makesbelieve, the men must be no less; +It fancies, feigns, deems, dears the artist after his art; +And fain will find as sterling all as all is smart, +And scarlet wear the spirit of war there express. + +Mark Christ our King. He knows war, served this soldiering + through; +He of all can handle a rope best. There he bides in bliss +Now, and seeing somewhere some man do all that man can do, +For love he leans forth, needs his neck must fall on, kiss, +And cry 'O Christ-done deed! So God-made-flesh does too: +Were I come o'er again' cries Christ 'it should be this'. + + +_40 +(Carrion Comfort)_ + +NOT, I'll not, carrion comfort, Despair, not feast on thee; +Not untwist--slack they may be--these last strands of man +In me or, most weary, cry _I can no more_. I can; +Can something, hope, wish day come, not choose not to be. +But ah, but O thou terrible, why wouldst thou rude on me +Thy wring-world right foot rock? lay a lionlimb against + me? scan +With darksome devouring eyes my bruised bones? and fan, +O in turns of tempest, me heaped there; me frantic to + avoid thee and flee? + +Why? That my chaff might fly; my grain lie, sheer + and clear. +Nay in all that toil, that coil, since (seems) I kissed the rod, +Hand rather, my heart lo! lapped strength, stole joy, + would laugh, cheer. +Cheer whom though? the hero whose heaven-handling + flung me, foot trod +Me? or me that fought him? O which one? is it each + one? That night, that year +Of now done darkness I wretch lay wrestling with (my + God!) my God. + + +_41_ + +No worst, there is none. Pitched past pitch of grief, +More pangs will, schooled at forepangs, wilder wring. +Comforter, where, where is your comforting? +Mary, mother of us, where is your relief? +My cries heave, herds-long; huddle in a main, a chief +Woe, world-sorrow; on an age-old anvil wince and sing-- +Then lull, then leave off. Fury had shrieked 'No ling- +ering! Let me be fell: force I must be brief'. + + O the mind, mind has mountains; cliffs of fall +Frightful, sheer, no-man-fathomed. Hold them cheap +May who ne'er hung there. Nor does long our small +Durance deal with that steep or deep. Here! creep, +Wretch, under a comfort serves in a whirlwind: all +Life death does end and each day dies with sleep. + + +_42 +Tom's Garland; + +upon the Unemployed_ + +TOM--garlanded with squat and surly steel +Tom; then Tom's fallowbootfellow piles pick +By him and rips out rockfire homeforth--sturdy Dick; +Tom Heart-at-ease, Tom Navvy: he is all for his meal +Sure, 's bed now. Low be it: lustily he his low lot (feel +That ne'er need hunger, Tom; Tom seldom sick, +Seldomer heartsore; that treads through, prickproof, + thick +Thousands of thorns, thoughts) swings though. Common- + weal +Little I reck ho! lacklevel in, if all had bread: +What! Country is honour enough in all us--lordly head, +With heaven's lights high hung round, or, mother-ground +That mammocks, mighty foot. But no way sped, +Nor mind nor mainstrength; gold go garlanded +With, perilous, O no; nor yet plod safe shod sound; + Undenizened, beyond bound +Of earth's glory, earth's ease, all; no one, nowhere, +In wide the world's weal; rare gold, bold steel, bare + In both; care, but share care-- +This, by Despair, bred Hangdog dull; by Rage, +Manwolf, worse; and their packs infest the age. + + +_43 +Harry Ploughman_ + +HARD as hurdle arms, with a broth of goldish flue +Breathed round; the rack of ribs; the scooped flank; lank +Rope-over thigh; knee-nave; and barrelled shank-- + Head and foot, shoulder and shank-- +By a grey eye's heed steered well, one crew, fall to; +Stand at stress. Each limb's barrowy brawn, his thew +That onewhere curded, onewhere sucked or sank-- + Soared or sank--, +Though as a beechbole firm, finds his, as at a roll- + call, rank +And features, in flesh, what deed he each must do-- + His sinew-service where do. + +He leans to it, Harry bends, look. Back, elbow, and + liquid waist +In him, all quail to the wallowing o' the plough: + 's cheek crimsons; curls +Wag or crossbridle, in a wind lifted, windlaced-- + See his wind- lilylocks -laced; +Churlsgrace, too, child of Amansstrength, how it hangs + or hurls +Them--broad in bluff hide his frowning feet lashed! raced +With, along them, cragiron under and cold furls-- + With-a-fountain's shining-shot furls. + + +_44_ + +To seem the stranger lies my lot, my life +Among strangers. Father and mother dear, +Brothers and sisters are in Christ not near +And he my peace my parting, sword and strife. + England, whose honour O all my heart woos, wife +To my creating thought, would neither hear +Me, were I pleading, plead nor do I: I wear- +y of idle a being but by where wars are rife. + + I am in Ireland now; now I am at a third +Remove. Not but in all removes I can +Kind love both give and get. Only what word +Wisest my heart breeds dark heaven's baffling ban +Bars or hell's spell thwarts. This to hoard unheard, +Heard unheeded, leaves me a lonely began. + + +_45_ + +I WAKE and feel the fell of dark, not day. +What hours, O what black houers we have spent +This night! what sights you, heart, saw; ways you went! +And more must, in yet longer light's delay. + With witness I speak this. But where I say +Hours I mean years, mean life. And my lament +Is cries countless, cries like dead letters sent +To dearest him that lives alas! away. + +I am gall, I am heartburn. God's most deep decree +Bitter would have me taste: my taste was me; +Bones built in me, flesh filled, blood brimmed the curse. + Selfyeast of spirit a dull dough sours. I see +The lost are like this, and their scourge to be +As I am mine, their sweating selves; but worse. + + +_46_ + +PATIENCE, hard thing! the hard thing but to pray, +But bid for, Patience is! Patience who asks +Wants war, wants wounds; weary his times, his tasks; +To do without, take tosses, and obey. + Rare patience roots in these, and, these away, +Nowhere. Natural heart's ivy, Patience masks +Our ruins of wrecked past purpose. There she basks +Purple eyes and seas of liquid leaves all day. + + We hear our hearts grate on themselves: it kills +To bruise them dearer. Yet the rebellious wills +Of us we do bid God bend to him even so. + And where is he who more and more distils +Delicious kindness?--He is patient. Patience fills +His crisp combs, and that comes those ways we know. + + +_47_ + +MY own heart let me have more pity on; let +Me live to my sad self hereafter kind, +Charitable; not live this tormented mind +With this tormented mind tormenting yet. + I cast for comfort I can no more get +By groping round my comfortless, than blind +Eyes in their dark can day or thirst can find +Thirst's all-in-all in all a world of wet. + +Soul, self; come, poor Jackself, I do advise +You, jaded, let be; call off thoughts awhile +Elsewhere; leave comfort root-room; let joy size +At God knows when to God knows what; whose smile +'s not wrung, see you; unforeseen times rather--as skies +Betweenpie mountains--lights a lovely mile. + + +_48 +That Nature is a Heraclitean Fire and of +the comfort of the Resurrection_ + +CLOUD-PUFFBALL, torn tufts, tossed pillows | flaunt forth, then + chevy on an air- +built thoroughfare: heaven-roysterers, in gay-gangs | they throng; + they glitter in marches. +Down roughcast, down dazzling whitewash, | wherever an elm + arches, +Shivelights and shadowtackle in long | lashes lace, lance, and pair. +Delightfully the bright wind boisterous | ropes, wrestles, beats + earth bare +Of yestertempest's creases; in pool and rut peel parches +Squandering ooze to squeezed | dough, crust, dust; stanches, + starches +Squadroned masks and manmarks | treadmire toil there +Footfretted in it. Million-fueled, | nature's bonfire burns on. +But quench her bonniest, dearest | to her, her clearest-selved spark +Man, how fast his firedint, | his mark on mind, is gone! +Both are in an unfathomable, all is in an enormous dark +Drowned. O pity and indig | nation! Manshape, that shone +Sheer off, disseveral, a star, | death blots black out; nor mark + Is any of him at all so stark +But vastness blurs and time | beats level. Enough! the Resur- + rection, +A heart's-clarion! Away grief's gasping, | joyless days, dejection. + Across my foundering deck shone +A beacon, an eternal beam. | Flesh fade, and mortal trash +Fall to the residuary worm; | world's wildfire, leave but ash: + In a flash, at a trumpet crash, +I am all at once what Christ is, | since he was what I am, and +This Jack, joke, poor potsherd, | patch, matchwood, immortal + diamond, + Is immortal diamond. + + +_49 +In honour of +St. Alphonsus Rodriguez +Laybrother of the Society of Jesus_ + +HONOUR is flashed off exploit, so we say; +And those strokes once that gashed flesh or galled shield +Should tongue that time now, trumpet now that field, +And, on the fighter, forge his glorious day. +On Christ they do and on the martyr may; +But be the war within, the brand we wield +Unseen, the heroic breast not outward-steeled, +Earth hears no hurtle then from fiercest fray. + + Yet God (that hews mountain and continent, +Earth, all, out; who, with trickling increment, +Veins violets and tall trees makes more and more) +Could crowd career with conquest while there went +Those years and years by of world without event +That in Majorca Alfonso watched the door. + + +_50_ + +_Justus quidem tu es, Domine, si disputem tecum: verum- +tamen justa loquar ad te: Quare via impiorum prospera- +tur? &c._ + +THOU art indeed just, Lord, if I contend +With thee; but, sir, so what I plead is just. +Why do sinners' ways prosper? and why must +Disappointment all I endeavour end? + + Wert thou my enemy, O thou my friend, +How wouldst thou worse, I wonder, than thou dost +Defeat, thwart me? Oh, the sots and thralls of lust +Do in spare hours more thrive than I that spend, +Sir, life upon thy cause. See, banks and brakes +Now, leaved how thick! laced they are again +With fretty chervil, look, and fresh wind shakes +Them; birds build--but not I build; no, but strain, +Time's eunuch, and not breed one work that wakes. +Mine, O thou lord of life, send my roots rain. + + +_51 +To R. B._ + +THE fine delight that fathers thought; the strong +Spur, live and lancing like the blowpipe flame, +Breathes once and, quenched faster than it came, +Leaves yet the mind a mother of immortal song. +Nine months she then, nay years, nine years she long +Within her wears, bears, cares and moulds the same: +The widow of an insight lost she lives, with aim +Now known and hand at work now never wrong. + Sweet fire the sire of muse, my soul needs this; +I want the one rapture of an inspiration. +O then if in my lagging lines you miss +The roll, the rise, the carol, the creation, +My winter world, that scarcely breathes that bliss +Now, yields you, with some sighs, our explanation. + + + +UNFINISHED POEMS +& FRAGMENTS + + +_52 +Summa_ + +THE best ideal is the true + And other truth is none. +All glory be ascribed to + The holy Three in One. + + +_53_ + +WHAT being in rank-old nature should earlier have that + breath been +That here personal tells off these heart-song powerful +peals?-- +A bush-browed, beetle-browed billow is it? +With a south-westerly wind blustering, with a tide rolls + reels +Of crumbling, fore-foundering, thundering all-surfy seas + in; seen +Underneath, their glassy barrel, of a fairy green. + . . . . . . . . +Or a jaunting vaunting vaulting assaulting trumpet telling + + +_54 +On the Portrait of Two Beautiful +Young People + +A Brother and Sister_ + +O I admire and sorrow! The heart's eye grieves +Discovering you, dark tramplers, tyrant years. +A juice rides rich through bluebells, in vine leaves, +And beauty's dearest veriest vein is tears. + + + +Happy the father, mother of these! Too fast: +Not that, but thus far, all with frailty, blest +In one fair fall; but, for time's aftercast, +Creatures all heft, hope, hazard, interest. + +And are they thus? The fine, the fingering beams +Their young delightful hour do feature down +That fleeted else like day-dissolved dreams +Or ringlet-race on burling Barrow brown. + +She leans on him with such contentment fond +As well the sister sits, would well the wife; +His looks, the soul's own letters, see beyond, +Gaze on, and fall directly forth on life. + +But ah, bright forelock, cluster that you are +Of favoured make and mind and health and youth, +Where lies your landmark, seamark, or soul's star? +There's none but truth can stead you. Christ is truth. + +There's none but good can be good, both for you +And what sways with you, maybe this sweet maid; +None good but God--a warning waved to +One once that was found wanting when Good weighed. + +Man lives that list, that leaning in the will +No wisdom can forecast by gauge or guess, +The selfless self of self, most strange, most still, +Fast furled and all foredrawn to No or Yes. + +Your feast of; that most in you earnest eye +May but call on your banes to more carouse. +Worst will the best. What worm was here, we cry, +To have havoc-pocked so, see, the hung-heavenward + boughs? + +Enough: corruption was the world's first woe. +What need I strain my heart beyond my ken? +O but I bear my burning witness though +Against the wild and wanton work of men. + . . . . . . . + + +_55_ + +THE sea took pity: it interposed with doom: +'I have tall daughters dear that heed my hand: +Let Winter wed one, sow them in her womb, +And she shall child them on the New-world strand.' + . . . . . . . . + + +_56 +(Ash-boughs)_ + +a. + +NOT of all my eyes see, wandering on the world, +Is anything a milk to the mind so, so sighs deep +Poetry to it, as a tree whose boughs break in the sky. +Say it is ashboughs: whether on a December day and + furled +Fast or they in clammyish lashtender combs creep +Apart wide and new-nestle at heaven most high. +They touch heaven, tabour on it; how their talons sweep +The smouldering enormous winter welkin! May +Mells blue and snowwhite through them, a fringe and fray +Of greenery: it is old earth's groping towards the steep + Heaven whom she childs us by. + +(Variant from line 7.) b. + +They touch, they tabour on it, hover on it[; here, there + hurled], + With talons sweep +The smouldering enormous winter welkin. [Eye, + But more cheer is when] May +Mells blue with snowwhite through their fringe and fray +Of greenery and old earth gropes for, grasps at steep + Heaven with it whom she childs things by. + + +_57_ + + . . . . . . . . +HOPE holds to Christ the mind's own mirror out +To take His lovely likeness more and more. +It will not well, so she would bring about +An ever brighter burnish than before +And turns to wash it from her welling eyes +And breathes the blots off all with sighs on sighs. +Her glass is blest but she as good as blind +Holds till hand aches and wonders what is there; +Her glass drinks light, she darkles down behind, +All of her glorious gainings unaware. + . . . . . . . . +I told you that she turned her mirror dim +Betweenwhiles, but she sees herself not Him. + . . . . . . . . + + +_53 +St. Winefred's Well + +ACT I. Sc. I + +_Enter Teryth from riding, Winefred following._ + +T. WHAT is it, Gwen, my girl? why do you hover and haunt me? + +W. You came by Caerwys, sir? + +T. I came by Caerwys. + +W. There + Some messenger there might have met you from my uncle. + +T. Your uncle met the messenger--met me; and this the + message: + Lord Beuno comes to-night. + +W. To-night, sir! + +T. Soon, now: therefore + Have all things ready in his room. + +W. There needs but little doing. + +T. Let what there needs be done. Stay! with him one com- + panion, + His deacon, Dirvan Warm: twice over must the welcome be, + But both will share one cell. This was good news, + Gwenvrewi. + +W. Ah yes! + +T. Why, get thee gone then; tell thy mother I want her. + _Exit Winefred._ + No man has such a daughter. The fathers of the world + Call no such maiden 'mine'. The deeper grows her + dearness + And more and more times laces round and round my heart, + The more some monstrous hand gropes with clammy fingers + there, + Tampering with those sweet bines, draws them out, strains + them, strains them; + Meantime some tongue cries 'What, Teryth! what, thou + poor fond father! + How when this bloom, this honeysuckle, that rides the air + so rich about thee, + Is all, all sheared away, thus!' Then I sweat for fear. + Or else a funeral, and yet 'tis not a funeral, + Some pageant which takes tears and I must foot with + feeling that + Alive or dead my girl is carried in it, endlessly + Goes marching thro' my mind. What sense is this? It + has none. + This is too much the father; nay the mother. Fanciful! + I here forbid my thoughts to fool themselves with fears. + + _Enter Gwenlo._ + + . . . . . . . . . . . + + +Act II.--_Scene, a wood ending in a steep bank over a dry dene, + Winefred having been murdered within. Re-enter Caradoc + with a bloody sword._ + +C. My heart, where have we been? What have we seen, my + mind? + What stroke has Caradoc's right arm dealt? what done? + Head of a rebel + Struck off it has; written upon lovely limbs, + In bloody letters, lessons of earnest, of revenge; + Monuments of my earnest, records of my revenge, + On one that went against me whereas I had warned her-- + Warned her! well she knew. I warned her of this work. + What work? what harm 's done? There is no harm done, + none yet; + Perhaps we struck no blow, Gwenvrewi lives perhaps; + To makebelieve my mood was--mock. I might think so + But here, here is a workman from his day's task sweats. + Wiped I am sure this was; it seems not well; for still, + Still the scarlet swings and dances on the blade. + So be it. Thou steel, thou butcher, + I can scour thee, fresh burnish thee, sheathe thee in thy + dark lair; these drops + Never, never, never in their blue banks again. + The woeful, Cradock, the woeful word! Then what, + What have we seen? Her head, sheared from her shoulders, + fall, + And lapped in shining hair, roll to the bank's edge; then + Down the beetling banks, like water in waterfalls, + It stooped and flashed and fell and ran like water away. + Her eyes, oh and her eyes! + In all her beauty, and sunlight to it is a pit, den, darkness, + Foam-falling is not fresh to it, rainbow by it not beaming, + In all her body, I say, no place was like her eyes, + No piece matched those eyes kept most part much cast down + But, being lifted, immortal, of immortal brightness. + Several times I saw them, thrice or four times turning; + Round and round they came and flashed towards heaven: + O there, + There they did appeal. Therefore airy vengeances + Are afoot; heaven-vault fast purpling portends, and what + first lightning + Any instant falls means me. And I do not repent; + I do not and I will not repent, not repent. + The blame bear who aroused me. What I have done violent + I have like a lion done, lionlike done, + Honouring an uncontrolled royal wrathful nature, + Mantling passion in a grandeur, crimson grandeur. + Now be my pride then perfect, all one piece. Henceforth + In a wide world of defiance Caradoc lives alone, + Loyal to his own soul, laying his own law down, no law nor + Lord now curb him for ever. O daring! O deep insight! + What is virtue? Valour; only the heart valiant. + And right? Only resolution; will, his will unwavering + Who, like me, knowing his nature to the heart home, + nature's business, + Despatches with no flinching. But will flesh, O can flesh + Second this fiery strain? Not always; O no no! + We cannot live this life out; sometimes we must weary + And in this darksome world what comfort can I find? + Down this darksome world comfort where can I find + When 'ts light I quenched; its rose, time's one rich rose, + my hand, + By her bloom, fast by her fresh, her fleeced bloom, + Hideous dashed down, leaving earth a winter withering + With no now, no Gwenvrewi. I must miss her most + That might have spared her were it but for passion-sake. Yes, + To hunger and not have, yet hope on for, to storm and + strive and + Be at every assault fresh foiled, worse flung, deeper dis- + appointed, + The turmoil and the torment, it has, I swear, a sweetness, + Keeps a kind of joy in it, a zest, an edge, an ecstasy, + Next after sweet success. I am not left even this; + I all my being have hacked in half with her neck: one part, + Reason, selfdisposal, choice of better or worse way, + Is corpse now, cannot change; my other self, this soul, + Life's quick, this kind, this keen self-feeling, + With dreadful distillation of thoughts sour as blood, + Must all day long taste murder. What do now then? + Do? Nay, + Deed-bound I am; one deed treads all down here cramps + all doing. What do? Not yield, + Not hope, not pray; despair; ay, that: brazen despair out, + Brave all, and take what comes--as here this rabble is come, + Whose bloods I reck no more of, no more rank with hers + Than sewers with sacred oils. Mankind, that mobs, comes. + Come! + +_Enter a crowd, among them Teryth, Gwenlo, Beuno._ + + . . . . . . . . . . . + +_After Winefred's raising from the dead and the breaking + out of the fountain._ + +BEUNO. O now while skies are blue, now while seas are salt, + While rushy rains shall fall or brooks shall fleet from + fountains, + While sick men shall cast sighs, of sweet health all despairing. + While blind men's eyes shall thirst after daylight, draughts + of daylight, + Or deaf ears shall desire that lipmusic that's lost upon them, + While cripples are, while lepers, dancers in dismal limb- + dance, + Fallers in dreadful frothpits, waterfearers wild, + Stone, palsy, cancer, cough, lung wasting, womb not bearing, + Rupture, running sores, what more? in brief, in burden, + As long as men are mortal and God merciful, + So long to this sweet spot, this leafy lean-over, + This Dry Dene, now no longer dry nor dumb, but moist + and musical + With the uproll and the downcarol of day and night + delivering + Water, which keeps thy name, (for not in rock written, + But in pale water, frail water, wild rash and reeling water, + That will not wear a print, that will not stain a pen, + Thy venerable record, virgin, is recorded). + Here to this holy well shall pilgrimages be, + And not from purple Wales only nor from elmy England, + But from beyond seas, Erin, France and Flanders, every- + where, + Pilgrims, still pilgrims, more pilgrims, still more poor pilgrims. + . . . . . . . . . . . + What sights shall be when some that swung, wretches, on + crutches + Their crutches shall cast from them, on heels of air departing, + Or they go rich as roseleaves hence that loathsome came + hither! + Not now to name even + Those dearer, more divine boons whose haven the heart is. + . . . . . . . . . . . + As sure as what is most sure, sure as that spring primroses + Shall new-dapple next year, sure as to-morrow morning, + Amongst come-back-again things, things with a revival, + things with a recovery, + Thy name . . . + + . . . . . . . . . . . + + +_59_ + +WHAT shall I do for the land that bred me, +Her homes and fields that folded and fed me?-- +Be under her banner and live for her honour: +Under her banner I'll live for her honour. + CHORUS. Under her banner live for her honour. + +Not the pleasure, the pay, the plunder, +But country and flag, the flag I am under-- +There is the shilling that finds me willing +To follow a banner and fight for honour. + CH. We follow her banner, we fight for her honour. + +Call me England's fame's fond lover, +Her fame to keep, her fame to recover. +Spend me or end me what God shall send me, +But under her banner I live for her honour. + CH. Under her banner we march for her honour. + +Where is the field I must play the man on? +O welcome there their steel or cannon. +Immortal beauty is death with duty, +If under her banner I fall for her honour. + CH. Under her banner we fall for her honour. + + +_60_ + +THE times are nightfall, look, their light grows less; +The times are winter, watch, a world undone: +They waste, they wither worse; they as they run +Or bring more or more blazon man's distress. +And I not help. Nor word now of success: +All is from wreck, here, there, to rescue one-- +Work which to see scarce so much as begun +Makes welcome death, does dear forgetfulness. + +Or what is else? There is your world within. +There rid the dragons, root out there the sin. +Your will is law in that small commonweal . . . + + +_61 +Cheery Beggar_ + +BEYOND Magdalen and by the Bridge, on a place called + there the Plain, + In Summer, in a burst of summertime + Following falls and falls of rain, +When the air was sweet-and-sour of the flown fineflower of +Those goldnails and their gaylinks that hang along a lime; + . . . . . . . . + + 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 butt'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 shelling or broad-shed +Tatter-tassel-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 paradisaical fruit, | lovely in waning but + lustreless, +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 hoary +Age gasp; whose breath is our _memento mori_-- +What bass 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 massacre 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_ + +HARK, hearer, hear what I do; lend a thought now, make believe +We are leafwhelmed somewhere with the hood +Of some branchy bunchy bushybowered wood, +Southern dene or Lancashire clough or Devon cleave, +That leans along the loins of hills, where a candycoloured, where + a gluegold-brown +Marbled river, boisterously beautiful, between +Roots and rocks is danced and dandled, all in froth and water- + blowballs, down. +We are there, when we hear a shout +That the hanging honeysuck, the dogeared hazels in the cover +Makes dither, makes hover +And the riot of a rout +Of, it must be, boys from the town +Bathing: it is summer's sovereign good. + +By there comes a listless stranger: beckoned by the noise +He drops towards the river: unseen +Sees the bevy of them, how the boys +With dare and with downdolphinry and bellbright bodies hud- + dling out, +Are earthworld, airworld, waterworld thorough hurled, all by + turn and turn about. + +This garland of their gambols flashes in his breast +Into such a sudden zest +Of summertime joys +That he hies to a pool neighbouring; sees it is the best +There; sweetest, freshest, shadowiest; +Fairyland; silk-beech, scrolled ash, packed sycamore, wild + wychelm, hornbeam fretty overstood +By. Rafts and rafts of flake-leaves light, dealt so, painted on the air, +Hang as still as hawk or hawkmoth, as the stars or as the angels + there, +Like the thing that never knew the earth, never off roots +Rose. Here he feasts: lovely all is! No more: off with-- + down he dings +His bleached both and woolwoven wear: +Careless these in coloured wisp +All lie tumbled-to; then with loop-locks +Forward falling, forehead frowning, lips crisp +Over finger-teasing task, his twiny boots +Fast he opens, last he offwrings +Till walk the world he can with bare his feet +And come where lies a coffer, burly all of blocks +Built of chancequarried, selfquained rocks +And the water warbles over into, filleted with glassy grassy + quicksilvery shives and shoots +And with heavenfallen freshness down from moorland still brims, +Dark or daylight on and on. Here he will then, here he will + the fleet +Flinty kindcold element let break across his limbs +Long. Where we leave him, froliclavish while he looks about + him, laughs, swims. + +Enough now; since the sacred matter that I mean +I should be wronging longer leaving it to float +Upon this only gambolling and echoing-of-earth note-- +What is ... the delightful dene? +Wedlock. What the water? Spousal love. + . . . . . . . . . . + . . . . . . . . . . +Father, mother, brothers, sisters, friends +Into fairy trees, wild flowers, wood ferns +Ranked round the bower + . . . . . . . . . . + + + +EDITOR'S NOTES + + +PREFACE TO NOTES + +AN editor of posthumous work is bounden to give some account +of the authority for his text; and it is the purpose of the follow- +ing notes to satisfy inquiry concerning matters whereof the +present editor has the advantage of first-hand or particular +knowledge. + +_Sources_ The sources are four, and will be distinguished as +A, B, D, and H, as here described. + + _A_ is my own collection, a MS. book made up of +Autographs--by which word I denote poems in the author's hand- +Writing--pasted into it as they were received from him, and also +of contemporary copies of other poems. These autographs and +copies date from '67 to '89, the year of his death. Additions +made by copying after that date are not reckoned or used. The +first two items of the facsimiles at page 70 are cuttings from A. + +_B_ is a MS. book, into which, in '83, I copied from _A_ certain +poems of which the author had kept no copy. He was remiss in +making fair copies of his work, and his autograph of The Deutsch- +land having been (seemingly) lost, I copied that poem and others +from _A_ at his request. After that date he entered more poems +in this book as he completed them, and he also made both +corrections of copy and emendations of the poems which had +been copied into it by me. Thus, if a poem occur in both _A_ and +_B_, then _B_ is the later and, except for overlooked errors of +copyist, the better authority. The last entry written by G. M. H. +into this book is of the date 1887. + +_D_ is a collection of the author's letters to Canon Dixon, the +only other friend who ever read his poems, with but few exceptions +whether of persons or of poems. These letters are in my keep- +ing; they contain autographs of a few poems with late corrections. + +_H_ is the bundle of posthumous papers that came into my +hands at the author's death. These were at the time examined, +sorted, and indexed; and the more important pieces of which +copies were taken were inserted into a scrap-book. That col- +lection is the source of a series of his most mature sonnets, and +of almost all the unfinished poems and fragments. Among these +papers were also some early drafts. The facsimile after p. 92 is +from _H_. + +_Method_ The latest autographs and autographic corrections have +Been preferred. In the very few instances in which this +principle was overruled, as in Nos. _1_ and _27_, the justi- +fication will be found in the note to the poem. The finished +poems from _1_ to _51_ are ranged chronologically by the years, but +in the section _52_-_74_ a fanciful grouping of the fragments was +preferred to the inevitable misrepresentations of conjectural +dating. G. M. H. dated his poems from their inception, and +however much he revised a poem he would date his recast as his +first draft. Thus _Handsome Heart_ was written and sent to me +in '79; and the recast, which I reject, was not made before '83, +while the final corrections may be some years later; and yet his +last autograph is dated as the first 'Oxford '79'. + +_Selection_ This edition purports to convey all the author's serious +Mature poems; and he would probably not have wished any +of his earlier poems nor so many or his fragments to +have been included. Of the former class three specimens only +are admitted--and these, which may be considered of exceptional +merit or interest, had already been given to the public--but of +the latter almost everything; because these scraps being of mature +date, generally contain some special beauty of thought or diction, +and are invariably of metrical or rhythmical interest: some of +them are in this respect as remarkable as anything in the volume. +As for exclusion, no translations of any kind are published here, +whether into Greek or Latin from the English of which there +are autographs and copies in _A_ or the Englishing of Latin +hymns occurring in _H_: these last are not in my opinion of +special merit; and with them I class a few religious pieces which +will be noticed later. + +_Author's Prosody_ Of the peculiar scheme of prosody invented and +developed by the author a full account is out of the question. His +own preface together with his description of the metrical scheme of +each poem--which is always, wherever it exists, transcribed in the +notes--may be a sufficient guide for practical purposes. Moreover, +the intention of the rhythm, in places where it might seem doubtful, +has been indicated by accents printed over the determining +syllables: in the later poems these accents correspond generally +with the author's own marks: in the earlier poems they do not, but +are trustworthy translations. + +_Marks_ It was at one time the author's practice to use a very +elaborate system of marks, all indicating the speech-movement: the +autograph (in _A_) of _Harry Ploughman_ carries seven different +marks, each one defined at the foot. When reading through his +letters for the purpose of determining dates, I noted a few +sentences on this subject which will justify the method that I +have followed in the text. In 1883 he wrote: 'You were right to +leave out the marks: they were not consistent for one thing, and +are always offensive. Stilt there must be some. Either I must +invent a notation applied throughout as in music or else I must +only mark where the reader is likely to mistake, and for the +present this is what I shall do.' And again in '85: 'This is my +difficulty, what marks to use and when to use them: they are so +much needed and yet so objectionable. (_Punctuation_) About +punctuation my mind is clear: I can give a rule for everything I +write myself, and even for other people, though they might +not agree with me perhaps.' In this last matter the autographs +are rigidly respected, the rare intentional aberration being +scrupulously noted. And so I have respected his indentation of +the verse; but in the sonnets, while my indentation corresponds, +as a rule, with some autograph, I have felt free to consider +conveniences, following, however, his growing practice to eschew +it altogether. + +Apart from questions of taste--and if these poems were to be +arraigned for errors of what may be called taste, +they might be convicted of occasional affectation in +metaphor, as where the hills are 'as a stallion stal- +wart, very-violet-sweet', or of some perversion of human feeling, +as, for instance, the 'nostrils' relish of incense along the sanctuary +side ', or 'the Holy Ghost with warm breast and with ah! bright +wings', these and a few such examples are mostly efforts to force +emotion into theological or sectarian channels, as in 'the com- +fortless unconfessed' and the unpoetic line 'His mystery must be +instressed stressed', or, again, the exaggerated Marianism of +some pieces, or the naked encounter of sensualism and asceticism +which hurts the 'Golden Echo'.-- + +_Style_ Apart, I say, from such faults of taste, which few as they +numerically are yet affect my liking and more repel my sympathy +than do all the rude shocks of his purely artistic wantonness-- +apart from these there are definite faults of style which a reader +must have courage to face, and must in some measure condone before +he can discover the great beauties. For these blemishes in the +poet's style are of such quality and magnitude as to deny him even +a hearing from those who love a continuous literary decorum and +are grown to be intolerant of its absence. And it is well to be +clear that there is no pretence to reverse the condemnation of +those faults, for which the poet has duly suffered. The extravagances +are and will remain what they were. Nor can credit be gained from +pointing them out: yet, to put readers at their ease, I will here +define them: they may be called Oddity and Obscurity; (_Oddity_) +and since the first may provoke laughter when a writer serious (and +this poet is always serious), while the latter must prevent him from +being understood (and this poet has always something to say), it +may be assumed that they were not a part of his intention. Something +of what he thought on this subject may be seen in the following +extracts from his letters. In Feb. 1879, he wrote: 'All therefore +that I think of doing is to keep my verses together in one place-- +at present I have not even correct copies--, that, if anyone should +like, they might be published after my death. And that again is +unlikely, as well as remote. . . . No doubt my poetry errs on the +side of oddness. I hope in time to have a more balanced and Miltonic +style. But as air, melody, is what strikes me most of all in music +and design in painting, so design, pattern, or what I am in the +habit of calling inscape is what I above all aim at in poetry. Now +it is the virtue of design, pattern, or inscape to be distinctive +and it is the vice of distinctiveness to become queer. This vice I +cannot have escaped.' And again two months later: 'Moreover +the oddness may make them repulsive at first and yet Lang +might have liked them on a second reading. Indeed when, on +somebody returning me the _Eurydice_, I opened and read some +lines, as one commonly reads whether prose or verse, with the +eyes, so to say, only, it struck me aghast with a kind of raw +nakedness and unmitigated violence I was unprepared for: but +take breath and read it with the ears, as I always wish to be +read, and my verse becomes all right.' + +_Obscurity_ As regards Oddity then, it is plain that the poet was +Himself fully alive to it, but he was not sufficiently aware of +obscurity, and he could not understand why his friends found his +sentences so difficult: he would never have believed that, among +all the ellipses and liberties of his grammar, the one chief cause +is his habitual omission of the relative pronoun; and yet this is +so, and the examination of a simple example or two may serve a +general purpose: + +_Omission of relative pronoun_ This grammatical liberty, though it +is a common convenience in conversation and has therefore its +proper place in good writing, is apt to confuse the parts of speech, +and to reduce a normal sequence of words to mere jargon. Writers +who carelessly rely on their elliptical speech-forms to govern the +elaborate sentences of their literary composition little know what +a conscious effort of interpretation they often impose on their +readers. But it was not carelessness in Gerard Hopkins: he had full +skill and practice and scholarship in conventional forms, and it is +easy to see that he banished these purely constructional syllables +from his verse because they took up room which he thought he could +not afford them: he needed in his scheme all his space for his +poetical words, and he wished those to crowd out every merely gram- +matical colourless or toneless element; and so when he had got +into the habit of doing without these relative pronouns--though +he must, I suppose, have supplied them in his thought,--he +abuses the licence beyond precedent, as when he writes (no. _17_) +'O Hero savest!' for 'O Hero that savest!'. + +_Identical Forms_ Another example of this (from the 5th stanza of +no. _23_) will discover another cause of obscurity; the line + + 'Squander the hell-rook ranks sally to molest him' + +means 'Scatter the ranks that sally to molest him': +but since the words _squander_ and _sally_ occupy similar positions +in the two sections of the verse, and are enforced by a similar +accentuation, the second verb deprived of its pronoun will follow +the first and appear as an imperative; and there is nothing to +prevent its being so taken but the contradiction that it makes in +the meaning; whereas the grammar should expose and enforce +the meaning, not have to be determined by the meaning. More- +over, there is no way of enunciating this line which will avoid the +confusion; because if, knowing that _sally_ should not have +the same intonation as _squander_, the reader mitigates the accent, +and in doing so lessens or obliterates the caesural pause which +exposes its accent, then _ranks_ becomes a genitive and _sally_ +a substantive. + +Here, then, is another source of the poet's obscurity; that in +aiming at condensation he neglects the need that there is for care +in the placing of words that are grammatically ambiguous. +English swarms with words that have one identical form for +substantive, adjective, and verb; and such a word should never +be so placed as to allow of any doubt as to what part of speech +it is used for; because such ambiguity or momentary uncertainty +destroys the force of the sentence. Now our author not only +neglects this essential propriety but he would seem even to +welcome and seek artistic effect in the consequent confusion; +and he will sometimes so arrange such words that a reader +looking for a verb may find that he has two or three ambiguous +monosyllables from which to select, and must be in doubt as to +which promises best to give any meaning that he can welcome; +and then, after his choice is made, he may be left +with some homeless monosyllable still on his hands. (_Homophones_) +Nor is our author apparently sensitive to the irrelevant +suggestions that our numerous homophones cause; and he +will provoke further ambiguities or obscurities by straining the +meaning of these unfortunate words. + +_Rhymes_ Finally, the rhymes where they are peculiar are often +repellent, and so far from adding charm to the verse that they +appear as obstacles. This must not blind one from recognizing +that Gerard Hopkins, where he is simple and straightforward +in his rhyme is a master of it--there are many instances,--but +when he indulges in freaks, his childishness is incredible. His +intention in such places is that the verses should be recited +as running on without pause, and the rhyme occurring in their +midst should be like a phonetic accident, merely satisfying the +prescribed form. But his phonetic rhymes are often indefensible +on his own principle. The rhyme to _communion_ in 'The Bugler' +is hideous, and the suspicion that the poet thought it ingenious is +appalling: _eternal_, in 'The Eurydice', does not correspond with +_burn all_, and in 'Felix Randal' _and some_ and _handsome_ is as +truly an eye-rhyme as the _love_ and _prove_ which he despised and +abjured; and it is more distressing, because the old-fashioned +conventional eye-rhymes are accepted as such without speech- +adaptation, and to many ears are a pleasant relief from the fixed +jingle of the perfect rhyme; whereas his false ear-rhymes ask to +have their slight but indispensable differences obliterated in the +reading, and thus they expose their defect, which is of a disagree- +able and vulgar or even comic quality. He did not escape full +criticism and ample ridicule for such things in his lifetime; and +in '83 he wrote: 'Some of my rhymes I regret, but they are past +changing, grubs in amber: there are only a few of these; others +are unassailable; some others again there are which malignity +may munch at but the Muses love.' + +_Euphony and emphasis_ Now these are bad faults, and, as I said, a +reader, if he is to get any enjoyment from the author's genius, +must be somewhat tolerant of them; and they have a real relation +to the means whereby the very forcible and original effects of +beauty are produced. There is nothing stranger in these poems than +the mixture of passages of extreme delicacy and exquisite diction +with passages where, in a jungle of rough root-words, emphasis +seems to oust euphony; and both these qualities, emphasis and +euphony, appear in their extreme forms. It was an idiosyncrasy +of this student's mind to push everything to its logical extreme, +and take pleasure in a paradoxical result; as may be seen in his +prosody where a simple theory seems to be used only as a basis for +unexampled liberty. He was flattered when I called him +_perittutatos_, and saw the humour of it--and one would expect +to find in his work the force of emphatic condensation and the +magic of melodious expression, both in their extreme forms. Now +since those who study style in itself must allow a proper place +to the emphatic expression, this experiment, which supplies as +novel examples of success as of failure, should be full of +interest; and such interest will promote tolerance. + +The fragment, of which a facsimile is given after page 92, is +the draft of what appears to be an attempt to explain how an +artist has not free-will in his creation. He works out his own +nature instinctively as he happens to be made, and is irresponsible +for the result. It is lamentable that Gerard Hopkins died when, +to judge by his latest work, he was beginning to concentrate the +force of all his luxuriant experiments in rhythm and diction, and +castigate his art into a more reserved style. Few will read the +terrible posthumous sonnets without such high admiration and +respect for his poetical power as must lead them to search out the +rare masterly beauties that distinguish his work. + + + +NOTES + + +PAGE 1. AUTHOR'S PREFACE. This is from B, and must have +been written in '83 or not much later. The punctuation +has been exactly followed, except that I have added +a comma after the word _language_ in the last line but one +of page 5, where the omission seemed an oversight. + +p.4, l. 21. _rove over_. This expression is used here to denote +the running on of the sense and sound of the end of +a verse into the beginning of the next; but this meaning +is not easily to be found in the word. + +The two words _reeve_ (pf. _rove_, which is also a pf. of +_rive_) and _reave_ (pf. _reft_) are both used several times by +G.M.H., but they are both spelt _reave_. In the present +context _rove_ and _reaving_ occur in his letters, and the +spelling _reeve_ in 'The Deutschland', xii. 8, is probably due +to the copyists. + +There is no doubt that G. M. H. had a wrong notion of +the meaning of the nautical term _reeve_. No. 39 line 10 (the +third passage where _reeve_, spelt _reave_, occurs, and a +nautical meaning is required--see the note there--) would +be satisfied by _splice_ (nautical); and if this notion were +influenced by _weave_, _wove_, that would describe the inter- +weaving of the verses. In the passage referred to in 'The +Deutschland' _reeve_ is probably intended in its dialectal or +common speech significance: see Wright's 'English Dialect +Dictionary', where the first sense of the verb given is to +bring together the 'gathers' of a dress: and in this sense +_reeve_ is in common use. + +p. 7. EARLY POEMS. Two school prize-poems exist; the date of +the first, 'The Escorial', is Easter '60, which is before +Poems G.M.H. was sixteen years old. It is in Spenserian +stanza: the imperfect copy in another hand has the first +15 stanzas omitting the 9th, and the author has written +on it his motto, _Batraxos de pot akridas os tis erisda_, +with an accompanying gloss to explain his allusions. +Though wholly lacking the Byronic flush it looks as if in- +fluenced by the historical descriptions in 'Childe Harold', +and might provide a quotation for a tourist's guide to +Spain. The history seems competent, and the artistic +knowledge precocious. + +Here for a sample is the seventh stanza: + +This was no classic temple order'd round +With massy pillars of the Doric mood +Broad-fluted, nor with shafts acanthus-crown'd, +Pourtray'd along the frieze with Titan's brood +That battled Gods for heaven; brilliant-hued, +With golden fillets and rich blazonry, +Wherein beneath the cornice, horsemen rode +With form divine, a fiery chivalry-- +Triumph of airy grace and perfect harmony. + +The second prize-poem, 'A Vision of Mermaids', is dated +Xmas '62. The autograph of this, which is preserved, is +headed by a very elaborate circular pen-and-ink drawing, +6 inches in diameter,--a sunset sea-piece with rocks and +formal groups of mermaidens, five or six together, singing +as they stand (apparently) half-immersed in the shallows +as described + +'But most in a half-circle watch'd the sun,' &c. + +This poem is in 143 lines of heroics. It betrays the in- +fluence of Keats, and when I introduced the author to the +public in Miles's book, I quoted from it, thinking it useful +to show that his difficult later style was not due to in- +ability to excel in established forms. The poem is alto- +gether above the standard of school-prizes. I reprint the +extract here: + +Soon--as when Summer of his sister Spring +Crushes and tears the rare enjewelling, +And boasting 'I have fairer thing's than these' +Plashes amidst the billowy apple-trees +His lusty hands, in gusts of scented wind +Swirling out bloom till all the air is blind +With rosy foam and pelting blossom and mists +Of driving vermeil-rain; and, as he lists, +The dainty onyx-coronals deflowers, +A glorious wanton;--all the wrecks in showers +Crowd down upon a stream, and jostling thick +With bubbles bugle-eyed, struggle and stick +On.tangled shoals that bar the brook a crowd +Of filmy globes and rosy floating cloud: +So those Mermaidens crowded to my rock. + +* * * * * + +But most in a half-circle watch'd the sun; +And a sweet sadness dwelt on every one; +I knew not why,--but know that sadness dwells +On Mermaids--whether that they ring the knells +Of seamen whelm'd in chasms of the mid-main, +As poets sing; or that it is a pain +To know the dusk depths of the ponderous sea, +The miles profound of solid green, and be +With loath'd cold fishes, far from man--or what;-- +I know the sadness but the cause know not. +Then they, thus ranged, gan make full plaintively +A piteous Siren sweetness on the sea, +Withouten instrument, or conch, or bell, +Or stretch'd chords tuneable on turtle's shell; +Only with utterance of sweet breath they sung +An antique chaunt and in an unknown tongue. +Now melting upward through the sloping scale +Swell'd the sweet strain to a melodious wail; +Now ringing clarion-clear to whence it rose +Slumber'd at last in one sweet, deep, heart-broken close. + +_1862-1868_ After the relics of his school-poems follow the +poems written when an undergraduate at Oxford, of which +there are four in this book--Nos. 1, 2, 3, and 52, all +dating about 1866. Of this period some ten or twelve +autograph poems exist, the most successful being religious +verses worked in Geo. Herbert's manner, and these, I think, +have been printed: there are two sonnets in Italian form and +Shakespearian mood (refused by 'Cornhill Magazine'); the +rest are attempts at lyrical poems, mostly sentimental +aspects of death: one of them 'Winter with the Gulf-stream' +was published in 'Once a Week', and reprinted at least in +part in some magazine: the autograph copy is dated Aug. 1871, +but G. M. H. told me that he wrote it when he was at school; +whence I guess that he altered it too much to allow of its +early dating. The following is a specimen of his signature +at this date. + +Gerard M. Hopkins. +July 24, 1866. + +Transcriber's note: This signature and date is displayed as a +handwritten image in the original. + +_1868-1875_ After these last-mentioned poems there is a gap of +Silence which may be accounted for in his own words from a +letter to R. W. D. Oct. 5, '78: 'What (verses) I had written +I burnt before I became a Jesuit (i.e. 1868) and re- +solved to write no more, as not belonging to my profession, +unless it were by the wish of my superiors; so for seven +years I wrote nothing but two or three little presentation +pieces which occasion called for. But when in the winter +of '75 the Deutschland was wrecked in the mouth of the +Thames and five Franciscan nuns, exiles from Germany +by the Falck Laws, aboard of her were drowned I was +affected by the account and happening to say so to my +rector he said that he wished some one would write a poem +on the subject. On this hint I set to work and, though +my hand was out at first, produced one. I had long had +haunting my ear the echo of a new rhythm which now +I realised on paper. ... I do not say the idea is altogether +new . . . but no one has professedly used it and made it +the principle throughout, that I know of. ... However +I had to mark the stresses . . . and a great many more +oddnesses could not but dismay an editor's eye, so that +when I offered it to our magazine _The Month_ . . . they +dared not print it.' + +Of the _two or three presentation pieces_ here mentioned +one is certainly the Marian verses 'Rosa mystica', published +in the 'The Irish Monthly', May '98, and again in Orby +Shipley's 'Carmina Mariana', 2nd series, p. 183: the +autograph exists. + +Another is supposed to be the 'Ad Mariam', printed in +the 'Stonyhurst Magazine', Feb. '94. This is in five +stanzas of eight lines, in direct and competent imitation of +Swinburne: no autograph has been found; and, unless +Fr. Hopkins's views of poetic form had been provisionally +deranged or suspended, the verses can hardly be attributed +to him without some impeachment of his sincerity; and +that being altogether above suspicion, I would not yield to +the rather strong presumption which their technical skill +supplies in favour of his authorship. It is true that the +'Rosa mystica' is somewhat in the same light lilting man- +ner; but that was probably common to most of these +festal verses, and 'Rosa mystica' is not open to the +positive objections of verbal criticism which would reject +the 'Ad Mariam'. He never sent me any copy of either +of these pieces, as he did of his severer Marian poems +(Nos. 18 and 37), nor mentioned them as productions of +his serious Muse. I do not find that in either class of +these attempts he met with any appreciation at the time; +it was after the publication of Miles's book in 1894 that +his co-religionists began to recognize his possible merits, +and their enthusiasm has not perhaps been always wise. +It is natural that they should, as some of them openly +state they do, prefer the poems that I am rejecting to +those which I print; but this edition was undertaken in +response to a demand that, both in England and America, +has gradually grown up from the genuinely poetic interest +felt in the poems which I have gradually introduced to the +public:--that interest has been no doubt welcomed and +accompanied by the applause of his particular religious +associates, but since their purpose is alien to mine I regret +that I am unable to indulge it; nor can I put aside the +overruling objection that G. M. H. would not have wished +these 'little presentation pieces' to be set among his more +serious artistic work. I do not think that they would +please any one who is likely to be pleased with this book. + +1. ST. DOROTHEA. Written when an exhibitioner at Balliol +College. Contemporary autograph in A, and another +almost identical in H, both undated. Text from A. This +poem was afterwards expanded, shedding its relative pro- +nouns, to 48 lines divided among three speakers, 'an +Angel, the protonotary Theophilus, (and) a Catechumen': +the grace and charm of original lost:--there is an auto- +graph in A and other copies exist. This was the first of +the poems that I saw, and G. M. H. wrote it out for me +(in 1866?). + +2. HEAVEN HAVEN. Contemporary autograph, on same page +with last, in H. Text is from a slightly later autograph +undated in A. The different copies vary. + +3. HABIT OF PERFECTION. Two autographs in A; the earlier +dated Jan. 18, 19, 1866. The second, which is a good +deal altered, is apparently of same date as text of No. 2. +Text follows this later version. Published in Miles. + +4. WRECK OF THE DEUTSCHLAND. Text from B, title from A +(see description of B on p. 94). In 'The Spirit of Man' +the original first stanza is given from A, and varies; +otherwise B was not much corrected. Another transcript, +now at St. Aloysius' College, Glasgow, was made by +Rev. F. Bacon after A but before the correction of B. +This was collated for me by the Rev. Father Geoffrey Bliss, +S.J., and gave one true reading. Its variants are distin- +guished by G in the notes to the poem. + +The labour spent on this great metrical experiment must +have served to establish the poet's prosody and perhaps +his diction: therefore the poem stands logically as well as +chronologically in the front of his book, like a great dragon +folded in the gate to forbid all entrance, and confident in +his strength from past success. This editor advises the +reader to circumvent him and attack him later in the rear; +for he was himself shamefully worsted in a brave frontal +assault, the more easily perhaps because both subject and +treatment were distasteful to him. A good method of +approach is to read stanza 16 aloud to a chance company. +To the metrist and rhythmist the poem will be of interest +from the first, and throughout. + +Stanza iv. 1. 7. Father Bliss tells me that the Voel is a +mountain not far from St. Beuno's College in N. Wales, +where the poem was written: and Dr. Henry Bradley that +_moel_ is primarily an adj. meaning _bald_: it becomes +a fem, subst. meaning _bare hill_, and preceded by the +article _y_ becomes _voel_, in modern Welsh spelt _foel_. This +accounts for its being written without initial capital, the +word being used genetically; and the meaning, obscured +by _roped_, is that the well is fed by the trickles of water +within the flanks of the mountains.--Both A and B read +_planks_ for _flanks_; G gives the correction. + +St. xi. 5. Two of the required stresses are on _we dream_. + +St. xii. 8. _reeve_, see note on Author's Preface, p. 101. + +St. xiv. 8. _these_. G has _there_; but the words between +_shock_ and _these_ are probably parenthetical. + +St. xvi. 3. Landsmen may not observe the wrongness: see +again No. 17, st. ix, and 39, line 10. I would have cor- +rected this if the euphony had not accidentally forbidden +the simplest correction. + +St. xvi. 7. _foam-fleece_ followed by full stop in A and B, +by a comma in G. + +St. xix. 3. _hawling_ thus spelt in all three. + +St. xxi. 2. G omits _the_. + +St. xxvi. 5 and 6. The semicolon is autographic correction in +B; the stop at _Way_ is uncertain in A and B, is a comma +in G. + +St. xxix. 3. _night_ (sic). + 8. Two of the required stresses are on _Tarpeian_. + +St. xxxiv. 8. _shire_. G has _shore_; but _shire_ is doubtless +right; it is the special favoured landscape visited by the +shower. + +5. PENMAEN POOL. Early copy in A. Text, title, and punctu- +ation from autograph in B, dated 'Barmouth, Merioneth- +shire. Aug. 1876'. But that autograph writes _leisure_ +for _pleasure_ in first line; _skulls_ in stanza 2; and in +stanza 8, _month_ has a capital initial. Several copies exist, +and vary. + +St. iii. 2. _Cadair Idris_ is written as a note to _Giant's stool_. + +St. viii. 4. Several variants. Two good copies read _dark- +some danksome_; but the early copy in A has _darksome +darksome_, which B returns to. + +St. ix. 3. A has _But praise it_, and two good copies _But +honour it_. + +6. 'THE SILVER JUBILEE: in honour of the Most Reverend James +first Bishop of Shrewsbury. St. Beuno's, Vale of Clwyd. +1876, I think.' A.--Text and title from autograph in B. +It was published with somebody's sermon on the same +occasion. Another copy in H. + +7. 'GOD'S GRANDEUR. Standard rhythm counterpoised.' Two +autographs, Feb. 23, 1877; and March 1877; in A.-- +Text is from corrections in B. The second version in A +has _lightning_ for _shining_ in line 2, explained in a letter +of Jan. 4, '83. B returns to original word. + +8. 'THE STARLIGHT NIGHT. Feb. 24, '77.' Autograph in A.-- +'Standard rhythm opened and counterpointed. March +'77.' A.--Later corrected version 'St. Beuno's, Feb. 77' +in B.--Text follows B. The second version in A was +published in Miles's book 'Poets and Poetry of the Century'. + +9. 'SPRING. (Standard rhythm, opening with sprung leadings), +May 1877.' Autograph in A.--Text from corrections in B, +but punctuation from A. Was published in Miles's book +from incomplete correction of A. + +10. 'THE LANTERN. (Standard rhythm, with one sprung lead- +ing and one line counterpomted.)' Autograph in A.-- +Text, title, and accents in lines 13 and 14, from corrections in +B, where it is called 'companion to No. 26, St. Beuno's '77'. + +11. 'WALKING BY THE SEA. Standard rhythm, in parts +sprung and in others counterpomted, Rhyl, May '77.' +A. This version deleted in B, and the revision given in +text written in with new title.--G. M. H. was not pleased +with this sonnet, and wrote the following explanation of it +in a letter '82: '_Rash fresh more_ (it is dreadful to +explain these things in cold blood) means a headlong and +exciting new snatch of singing, resumption by the lark of +his song, which by turns he gives over and takes up again +all day long, and this goes on, the sonnet says, through +all time, without ever losing its first freshness, being +a thing both new and old. _Repair_ means the same thing, +renewal, resumption. The _skein_ and _coil_ are the lark's +song, which from his height gives the impression of some- +thing falling to the earth and not vertically quite but +tricklingly or wavingly, something as a skein of silk ribbed +by having been tightly wound on a narrow card or +a notched holder or as twine or fishing-tackle unwinding +from a _reel_ or _winch_ or as pearls strung on a horsehair: +the laps or folds are the notes or short measures and bars +of them. The same is called a _score_ in the musical sense +of score and this score is "writ upon a liquid sky +trembling to welcome it", only not horizontally. The lark +in wild glee _races the reel round_, paying or dealing out +and down the turns of the skein or _coil_ right to the earth +_floor_, the ground, where it lies in a heap, as it were, or +rather is all wound off on to another winch, reel, bobbin +or spool in Fancy's eye, by the moment the bird touches +earth and so is ready for a fresh unwinding at the next +flight. _Crisp_ means almost _crisped_, namely with notes.' + +12 'THE WINDHOVER. (Falling paeonic rhythm, sprung and +outriding.)' Two contemporary autographs in A.--Text +and dedication from corrected B, dated St. Beuno's, May +30, 1877. In a letter June 22, '79: 'I shall shortly send +you an amended copy of The Windhover: the amendment +only touches a single line, I think, but as that is the best +thing I ever wrote I should like you to have it in its +best form.' + +13 'PIED BEAUTY. Curtal Sonnet: sprung paeonic rhythm. +St. Beuno's, Tremeirchion. Summer '77.' Autograph in +A.--B agrees. + +14 'HURRAHING IN HARVEST: Sonnet (sprung and outriding +rhythm. Take notice that the outriding feet are not to be +confused with dactyls or paeons, though sometimes the +line might be scanned either way. The strong syllable in +an outriding foot has always a great stress and after the +outrider follows a short pause. The paeon is easier and +more flowing). Vale of Clwyd, Sept. 1, 1877.' Auto- +graph in A. Text is from corrected B, punctuation of +original A. In a letter '78 he wrote: 'The Hurrahing +sonnet was the outcome of half an hour of extreme en- +thusiasm as I walked home alone one day from fishing in +the Elwy.' A also notes 'no counterpoint'. + +15 'THE CAGED SKYLARK. (Falling paeonic rhythm, sprung +and outriding.)' Autograph in A. Text from corrected +B which dates St. Beuno's, 1877. In line 13 B writes +_uncumbered_. + +16. 'IN THE VALLEY OF THE ELWY. (Standard rhythm, sprung +and counterpointed.)' Autograph in A. Text is from +corrected B, which dates as contemporary with No. 15, +adding 'for the companion to this see No.' 35. + +17. THE LOSS OF THE EURYDICE. A contemporary copy in A +has this note: 'Written in sprung rhythm, the third line +has 3 beats, the rest 4. The scanning runs on without +break to the end of the stanza, so that each stanza is +rather one long line rhymed in passage than four lines +with rhymes at the ends.'--B has an autograph of the +poem as it came to be corrected ('83 or after), without +the above note and dated 'Mount St. Mary, Derbyshire, +Apr. '78'.--Text follows B.--The injurious rhymes are +partly explained in the old note. + +St. 9. _Shorten sail_. The seamanship at fault: but this ex- +pression may be glossed by supposing the boatswain to +have sounded that call on his whistle. + +St. 12. _Cheer's death_, i.e. despair. + +St, 14. _It is even seen_. In a letter May 30, '78, he ex- +plains: 'You mistake the sense of this as I feared it would +be mistaken. I believed Hare to be a brave and con- +scientious man, what I say is that _even_ those who seem +unconscientious will act the right part at a great push. . . . +About _mortholes_ I wince a little.' + +St. 26. _A starlight-wender_, i.e. The island was so Marian +that the folk supposed the Milky Way was a fingerpost to +guide pilgrims to the shrine of the Virgin at Walsingham. +_And one_, that is Duns Scotus the champion of the Im- +maculate Conception. See Sonnet No. 20. + +St. 27. _Well wept_. Grammar is as in 'Well hit! well run!' +&c. The meaning 'You do well to weep'. + +St. 28. _O Hero savest_. Omission of relative pronoun at its +worst. = _O Hero that savest_. The prayer is in a mourner's +mouth, who prays that Christ will have saved her hero, +and in stanza 29 the grammar triumphs. + +18. 'THE MAY MAGNIFICAT. (Sprung rhythm, four stresses +in each line of the first couplet, three in each of the second. +Stonyhurst, May '78.') Autograph in A.--Text from +later autograph in B. He wrote to me: 'A Maypiece in +which I see little good but the freedom of the rhythm.' +In penult stanza _cuckoo-call_ has its hyphen deleted in B, +leaving the words separate. + +19. 'BINSEY POPLARS, felled 1879. Oxford, March 1879.' Auto- +graph in A. Text from B, which alters four places. +l. 8 _weed-winding_: an early draft has _weed-wounden_. + +20. 'DUNS SCOTUS'S OXFORD. Oxford, March 1879.' Auto- +graph in A. Copy in B agrees but dates 1878. + +21. 'HENRY PURCELL. (Alexandrine: six stresses to the line. +Oxford, April 1879.)' Autograph in A with argument as +printed. Copy in B is uncorrected except that it adds the +word _fresh_ in last line. + +'"Have fair fallen." _Have_ is the sing, imperative (or +optative if you like) of the past, a thing possible and +actual both in logic and grammar, but naturally a rare +one. As in the 2nd pers. we say "Have done" or in mak- +ing appointments "Have had your dinner beforehand", +so one can say in the 3rd pers. not only "Fair fall" of +what is present or future but also "Have fair fallen" +of what is past. The same thought (which plays a great +part in my own mind and action) is more clearly expressed +in the last stanza but one of the _Eurydice_, where you +remarked it.' Letter to R. B., Feb. 3, '83. + +'The sestet of the Purcell sonnet is not so clearly worked +out as I could wish. The thought is that as the seabird +opening his wings with a whiff of wind in your face means +the whirr of the motion, but also unaware gives you +a whiff of knowledge about his plumage, the marking of +which stamps his species, that he does not mean, so +Purcell, seemingly intent only on the thought or feeling he +is to express or call out, incidentally lets you remark the +individualising marks of his own genius. + +'_Sake_ is a word I find it convenient to use ... it is the +_sake_ of "for the sake of ", _forsake_, _namesake_, _keepsake_. +I mean by it the being a thing has outside itself, as a voice +by its echo, a face by its reflection, a body by its shadow, +a man by his name, fame, or memory, _and also_ that in +the thing by virtue of which especially it has this being +abroad, and that is something distinctive, marked, speci- +fically or individually speaking, as for a voice and echo +clearness; for a reflected image light, brightness; for +a shadow-casting body bulk; for a man genius, great +achievements, amiability, and so on. In this case it is, as +the sonnet says, distinctive quality in genius. ... By +_moonmarks_ I mean crescent-shaped markings on the quill- +feathers, either in the colouring of the feather or made by +the overlapping of one on another.' Letter to R. B., +May 26, '79. + +22. 'PEACE: Oxford, 1879.' Autograph in B, where a comma +after _daunting_ is due to following a deletion. _To own +my heart_ = _to my own heart_. _Reaving Peace_, i.e. when +he reaves or takes Peace away, as No. 35, l. 12. An early +draft dated Oct. 2, '79, has _taking_ for _reaving_. + +23. 'THE BUGLER'S FIRST COMMUNION. (Sprung rhythm, +overrove, an outride between the 3rd and 4th foot of the +4th line in each stanza.) Oxford, July 27,(?) 1879.' A.-- +My copy of this in B shows three emendations. First +draft exists in H. Text is A with the corrections from B. +At nine lines from end, _Though this_, A has _Now this_, +and _Now_ is deliberately preferred in H.--B has some un- +corrected miscopyings of A. _O for, now, charms of_ A is +already a correction in H. I should like a comma at end +of first line of 5th stanza and an interjection-mark at +end of that stanza. + +24. 'MORNING MIDDAY AND EVENING SACRIFICE. Oxford, +Aug. '79.' Autograph in A. The first stanza reproduced +after p. 70. Copied by me into B, where it received cor- +rection. Text follows B except in lines 19 and 20, where +the correction reads _What Death half lifts the latch of, +What hell hopes soon the snatch of_. And punctuation is +not all followed: original has comma after the second _this_ +in lines 5 and 6. On June 30, '86, G. M. H. wrote to +Canon Dixon, who wished to print the first stanza alone +in some anthology, and made _ad hoc_ alterations which +I do not follow. The original 17th line was _Silk-ashed +but core not cooling_, and was altered because of its +obscurity. 'I meant (he wrote) to compare grey hairs to +the flakes of silky ash which may be seen round wood +embers . . . and covering a core of heat. . . .' _Your offer- +ing, with despatch, of_ is said like 'your ticket', 'your +reasons', 'your money or your life . . .' It is: 'Come, your +offer of all this (the matured mind), and without delay +either!' + +25. 'ANDROMEDA. Oxford, Aug. 12, '79.' A--which B cor- +rects in two places only. Text rejects the first, in line 4 +_dragon_ for _dragon's_: but follows B in line 10, where A +had _Air, pillowy air_. There is no comma at _barebill_ in +any MS., but a gap and sort of caesural mark in A. In +a letter Aug. 14, '79, G. M. H. writes: 'I enclose a sonnet +on which I invite minute criticism. I endeavoured in it at +a more Miltonic plainness and severity than I have any- +where else. I cannot say it has turned out severe, still +less plain, but it seems almost free from quaintness and in +aiming at one excellence I may have hit another.' + +26. 'THE CANDLE INDOORS. (Common rhythm, counter- +pointed.) Oxford, '79.' A. Text takes corrections of +B, which adds 'companion to No.' 10. A has in line 2 +_With a yellowy_, and 5 _At that_. + +27. 'THE HANDSOME HEART. (Common rhythm counter- +pointed.) Oxford, '79.' A1.--In Aug. of the same year +he wrote that he was surprised at my liking it, and in +deference to my criticism sent a revise, A2.--Subsequently +he recast the sonnet mostly in the longer 6-stress lines, +and wrote that into B.--In that final version the charm +and freshness have disappeared: and his emendation in +evading the clash of _ply_ and _reply_ is awkward; also the +fourteen lines now contain seven _whats_. I have therefore +taken A1 for the text, and have ventured, in line 8, to +restore _how to_, in the place of _what_, from the original +version which exists in H. In 'The Spirit of Man' I gave +a mixture of A1 and A2. In line 5 the word _soul_ is in +H and A1: but A2 and B have _heart_. _Father_ in second +line was the Rev. Father Gerard himself. He tells the +whole story in a letter to me. + +28. 'AT A WEDDING. (Sprung rhythm.) Bedford, Lancashire, +Oct. 21, '79.' A. Autograph uncorrected in B, but title +changed to that in text. + +29. 'FELIX RANDAL. (Sonnet: sprung and outriding rhythm; +six-foot lines.) Liverpool, Apr. 28, '80.' A. Text from +A with the two corrections of B. The comma in line 5 +after _impatient_ is omitted in copy in B. + +30. 'BROTHERS. (Sprung rhythm; three feet to the line; lines +free-ended and not overrove; and reversed or counter- +pointed rhythm allowed in the first foot.) Hampstead, +Aug. 1880.' Five various drafts exist. A1 and A2 both of +Aug. '80. B was copied by me from A1, and author's +emendations of it overlook those in A2. Text therefore is +from A 2 except that the first seven lines, being rewritten +in margin afresh (and confirmed in letter of Ap. '81 to +Canon Dixon), as also corrections in lines 15-18, these are +taken. But the B corrections of lines 22, 23, almost +certainly imply forgetfulness of A^. In last line B has +correction _Dearly thou canst be kind_; but the intention +of _I'll cry_ was original, and has four MSS. in its favour. + +31. 'SPRING AND FALL. (Sprung rhythm.) Lydiate, Lan- +cashire, Sept. 7, 1880.' A. Text and title from B, +which corrects four lines, and misdates '81. There is also +a copy in D, Jan. '81, and see again Apr. 6, '81. In line 2 +the last word is _unleafing_ in most of the MSS. An +attempt to amend the second rhyme was unsuccessful. + +32. 'SPELT FROM SIBYL'S LEAVES. (Sonnet: sprung rhythm: +a rest of one stress in the first line.)' Autograph in A-- +another later in B, which is taken for text. Date unre- +corded, lines 5, 6, _astray_ thus divided to show the +rhyme.--6. _throughther_, an adj., now confined to dialect. +It is the speech form of _through-other_, in which shape it +eludes pursuit in the Oxford dictionary. Dr. Murray +compares Ger. _durch einander_. Mr. Craigie tells me that +the classical quotation for it is from Burns's 'Halloween', +st. 5, _They roar an cry a' throughther_.--line 8. _With_, +i.e. I suppose, _with your warning that_, &c.: the heart +is speaking. 9. _beak-leaved_ is not hyphened in MS.-- +11. _part, pen, pack_, imperatives of the verbs, in the +sense of sorting 'the sheep from the goats'.--12. A has +_wrong right_, but the correction to _right wrong_ in B is +intentional. 14.--_sheathe-_ in both MSS., but I can only +make sense of _sheath-_, i.e. 'sheathless and shelterless'. +The accents in this poem are a selection from A and B. + +33. 'INVERSNAID. Sept. 28, 1881.' Autograph in H. I have +found no other trace of this poem. + +34. _As kingfishers_. Text from undated autograph in H, a draft +with corrections and variants. In lines 3 and 4 _hung_ and +_to fling out broad_ are corrections in same later pencilling +as line 5, which occurs only thus with them. In sestet +the first three lines have alternatives of regular rhythm, +thus: + + Then I say more: the just man justices; + Keeps grace and that keeps all his goings graces; + In God's eye acts, &c. + +Of these lines, in 9 and 10 the version given in text is +later than the regular lines just quoted, and probably pre- +ferred: in l. 11 the alternatives apparently of same date. + +35. 'RIBBLESDALE. Stonyhurst, 1882.' Autograph in A. Text +from later autograph in B, which adds 'companion to +No. 10' (= 16). There is a third autograph in D, June +'83 with different punctuation which gives the comma +between _to_ and _with_ in line 3. The dash after _man_ is +from A and D, both of which quote 'Nam expectatio +creaturae ', &c. from Romans viii. 19. In the letter to +R. W. D. he writes: '_Louched_ is a coinage of mine, and is +to mean much the same as slouched, slouching, and I mean +_throng_ for an adjective as we use it in Lancashire'. +But _louch_ has ample authority, see the 'English Dialect +Dictionary'. + +36. 'THE LEADEN ECHO AND THE GOLDEN ECHO. Stony- +hurst, Oct. 13, '82.' Autograph in A. Copy of this +with autograph corrections dated Hampstead '81 (_sic_) in +B.--Text takes all B's corrections, but respects punctuation +of A, except that I have added the comma after _God_ in +last line of p. 56. For the drama of Winefred, see among +posthumous fragments, No. 58. In Nov. 1882 he wrote +to me: 'I am somewhat dismayed about that piece and +have laid it aside for a while. I cannot satisfy myself +about the first line. You must know that words like +_charm_ and _enchantment_ will not do: the thought is of +beauty as of something that can be physically kept and +lost and by physical things only, like keys; then the +things must come from the _mundus muliebris_; and +thirdly they must not be markedly oldfashioned. You +will sec that this limits the choice of words very much +indeed. However I shall make some changes. _Back_ is +not pretty, but it gives that feeling of physical constraint +which I want.' And in Oct. '86 to R. W. D., 'I never did +anything more musical'. + +37. 'MARY MOTHER OF DIVINE GRACE COMPARED TO THE +AIR WE BREATHE. Stonyhurst, May '83.' Autograph +in A.--Text and title from later autograph in B. Taken +by Dean Beeching into 'A Book of Christmas Verse' 1895 +and thence, incorrectly, by Orby Shipley in 'Carmina +Mariana'. Stated in a letter to R. W. D. June 25, '83, +to have been written to 'hang up among the verse com- +positions in the tongues. ... I did a piece in the same +metre as _Blue in the mists all day_.' Note Chaucer's +account of the physical properties of the air, 'House of +Fame', ii. 256, seq. + +38. 'To WHAT SERVES MORTAL BEAUTY? (Common rhythm +highly stressed: sonnet.) Aug. 23, '85.' Autograph in +A.--Another autograph in B with a few variants from +which A was chosen, the deletion of alternatives incom- +plete. Thirdly a copy sent to R. W. D., apparently later +than A, but with errors of copy. The text given is guided +by this version in D, and _needs_ in line 9 is substituted +there for the _once_ in A and B, probably because of _once_ +in line 6.--Original draft exists in H, on same page with +39 and 40. The following is his signature at this date: + +Your affectionate friend +Gerard M. Hopkins S.J. +May 29 1885 + +Transcriber's note: This signature and date is displayed as a +handwritten image in the original. + +39. SOLDIER. 'Clongower, Aug. 1885.' Autograph in H, +with a few corrections which I have taken for lines 6 and +7, of which the first draft runs: + + It fancies; it deems; dears the artist after his art; + So feigns it finds as, &c. + +The MS. marks the caesural place in ten of the lines +in line 2, between _Both_ and _these_. l 3, at the full stop. +l. 6, _fancies_, _feigns_, _deems_, take three stresses. l. 11, +after _man_. In line 7 I have added a comma at _smart_. +In l. 10 I have substituted _handle_ for _reave_ of MS.: see +note on _reave_, p. 101; and in l. 13, have hyphened _God +made flesh_. No title in MS. + +40. CARRION COMFORT. Autograph in H, in three versions. +1st, deleted draft. 2nd, a complete version, both on same +page with 38 and 39. 3rd, with 41 on another sheet, +final (?) revision carried only to end of 1. 12 (two detached +lines on reverse). Text is this last with last two lines +from the 2nd version. Date must be 1885, and this is +probably the sonnet 'written in blood', of which he wrote +in May of that year.--I have added the title and the +hyphen in _heaven-handling_. + +41. _No worst_. Autograph in H, on same page as third draft of +40. One undated draft with corrections embodied in the +text here.--l. 5, at end are some marks which look like +a hyphen and a comma: no title. + +42. 'TOM'S GARLAND. Sonnet: common rhythm, but with +hurried feet: two codas. Dromore, Sept. '87.' With +full title, A.--Another autograph in B is identical. In +line 9 there is a strong accent on _I_.--l. 10, the capital +initial of _country_ is doubtful.--Rhythmical marks omitted. +The author's own explanation of this poem may be read +in a letter written to me from 'Dublin, Feb. 10, '88: ... +I laughed outright and often, but very sardonically, to +think you and the Canon could not construe my last son- +net; that he had to write to you for a crib. It is plain +I must go no further on this road: if you and he cannot +understand me who will? Yet, declaimed, the strange +constructions would be dramatic and effective. Must +I interpret it? It means then that, as St. Paul and Plato +and Hobbes and everybody says, the commonwealth or +well-ordered human society is like one man; a body with +many members and each its function; some higher, some +lower, but all honourable, from the honour which belongs +to the whole. The head is the sovereign, who has no +superior but God and from heaven receives his or her +authority: we must then imagine this head as bare (see +St. Paul much on this) and covered, so to say, only with +the sun and stars, of which the crown is a symbol, which +is an ornament but not a covering; it has an enormous +hat or skullcap, the vault of heaven. The foot is the day- +labourer, and this is armed with hobnail boots, because it +has to wear and be worn by the ground; which again is +symbolical; for it is navvies or day-labourers who, on the +great scale or in gangs and millions, mainly trench, tunnel, +blast, and in other ways disfigure, "mammock" the earth +and, on a small scale, singly, and superficially stamp it +with their footprints. And the "garlands" of nails they +wear are therefore the visible badge of the place they fill, +the lowest in the commonwealth. But this place still +shares the common honour, and if it wants one advantage, +glory or public fame, makes up for it by another, ease of +mind, absence of care; and these things are symbolised +by the gold and the iron garlands. (O, once explained, +how clear it all is!) Therefore the scene of the poem is +laid at evening, when they are giving over work and one +after another pile their picks, with which they earn their +living, and swing off home, knocking sparks out of mother +earth not now by labour and of choice but by the mere +footing, being strong-shod and making no hardship of hard- +ness, taking all easy. And so to supper and bed. Here +comes a violent but effective hyperbaton or suspension, in +which the action of the mind mimics that of the labourer-- +surveys his lot, low but free from care; then by a sudden +strong act throws it over the shoulder or tosses it away as +a light matter. The witnessing of which lightheartedness +makes me indignant with the fools of Radical Levellers. +But presently I remember that this is all very well for +those who are in, however low in, the Commonwealth and +share in any way the common weal; but that the curse of +our times is that many do not share it, that they are out- +casts from it and have neither security nor splendour; +that they share care with the high and obscurity with the +low, but wealth or comfort with neither. And this state +of things, I say, is the origin of Loafers, Tramps, Corner- +boys, Roughs, Socialists and other pests of society. And +I think that it is a very pregnant sonnet, and in point +of execution very highly wrought, too much so, I am +afraid. ... G.M.H.' + +43. 'HARRY PLOUGHMAN. Dromore, Sept. 1887.' Autograph +in A.--Autograph in B has several emendations written +over without deletion of original. Text is B with these +corrections, which are all good.--line 10, _features_ is the +verb.--13, _'s_ is _his_. I have put a colon at _plough_, in +place of author's full stop, for the convenience of reader.-- +15 = _his lilylocks windlaced_. 'Saxo cere- comminuit +-brum.'--17, _Them. These_, A.--In the last three lines +the grammar intends, 'How his churl's grace governs the +movement of his booted (in bluff hide) feet, as they are +matched in a race with the wet shining furrow overturned +by the share'. G. M. H. thought well of this sonnet and +wrote on Sept. 28, 1887: 'I have been touching up some +old sonnets you have never seen and have within a few +days done the whole of one, I hope, very good one and +most of another; the one finished is a direct picture of +a ploughman, without afterthought. But when you read +it let me know if there is anything like it in Walt Whit- +man; as perhaps there may be, and I should be sorry for +that.' And again on Oct. 11, '87: 'I will enclose the +sonnet on Harry Ploughman, in which burden-lines (they +might be recited by a chorus) are freely used: there is in +this very heavily loaded sprung rhythm a call for their +employment. The rhythm of this sonnet, which is alto- +gether for recital, and not for perusal (as by nature verse +should be), is very highly studied. From much consider- +ing it I can no longer gather any impression of it: perhaps +it will strike you as intolerably violent and artificial.' And +again on Nov. 6, '87: 'I want Harry Ploughman to be +a vivid figure before the mind's eye; if he is not that the +sonnet fails. The difficulties are of syntax no doubt. +Dividing a compound word by a clause sandwiched into it +was a desperate deed, I feel, and I do not feel that it was +an unquestionable success.' + +44, 45, 46, 47. These four sonnets (together with No. 56) are +all written undated in a small hand on the two sides of +a half-sheet of common sermon-paper, in the order in which +they are here printed. They probably date back as early +as 1885, and may be all, or some of them, those referred to +in a letter of Sept. 1, 1885: 'I shall shortly have some +sonnets to send you, five or more. Four of these came +like inspirations unbidden and against my will. And in +the life I lead now, which is one of a continually jaded +and harassed mind, if in any leisure I try to do anything +I make no way--nor with my work, alas! but so it must +be.' I have no certain nor single identification of date. + +44. _To seem the stranger_. H, with corrections which my text +embodies.--l. 14, _began_. I have no other explanation +than to suppose an omitted relative pronoun, like _Hero +savest_ in No. 17. The sentence would then stand for +'leaves me a lonely (one who only) began'. No title. + +45. _I wake and feel_. H, with corrections which text embodies: +no title. + +46. PATIENCE. As 45. l. 2, _Patience is_. The initial capital is +mine, and the comma after _ivy_ in line 6. No title. + +47 _My own heart_. As 45.--1. 6, I have added the comma after +_comfortless_; that word has the same grammatical value as +_dark_ in the following line. 'I cast for comfort, (which) +I can no more find in my comfortless (world) than a blind +man in his dark world. . . .'--l. 10, MS. accents _let_.-- +13 and 14, the text here from a good correction separately +written (as far as _mountains_) on the top margin of No. 56. +There are therefore two writings of _betweenpie_, a strange +word, in which _pie_ apparently makes a compound verb +with _between_, meaning 'as the sky seen between dark +mountains is brightly dappled', the grammar such as +_intervariegates_ would make. This word might have +delighted William Barnes, if the verb 'to pie' existed. +It seems not to exist, and to be forbidden by homophonic +absurdities. + +48. 'HERACLITEAN FIRE. (Sprung rhythm, with many out- +rides and hurried feet: sonnet with two [_sic_] codas.) +July 26, 1888. Co. Dublin. The last sonnet [this] pro- +visional only.' Autograph in A.--I have found no other +copy nor trace of draft. The title is from A.--line 6, con- +struction obscure, _rutpeel_ may be a compound word, +MS. uncertain. 8, ? omitted relative pronoun. If so = +'the manmarks that treadmire toil foot-fretted in it'. MS. +does not hyphen nor quite join up _foot_ with _fretted_.-- +12. MS. has no caesural mark.--On Aug. 18, '88, he +wrote: 'I will now go to bed, the more so as I am going to +preach tomorrow and put plainly to a Highland congrega- +tion of MacDonalds, Mackintoshes, Mackillops, and the +rest what I am putting not at all so plainly to the rest of +the world, or rather to you and Canon Dixon, in a sonnet +in sprung rhythm with two codas.' And again on Sept. +25, '88: 'Lately I sent you a sonnet on the Heraclitean +Fire, in which a great deal of early Greek philosophical +thought was distilled; but the liquor of the distillation +did not taste very greek, did it? The effect of studying +masterpieces is to make me admire and do otherwise. So +it must be on every original artist to some degree, on me +to a marked degree. Perhaps then more reading would +only _refine my singularity_, which is not what you want.' +Note, that the sonnet has three codas, not two. + +49. ALFONSUS. Text from autograph with title and 'upon the +first falling of his feast after his canonisation' in B. An +autograph in A, sent Oct. 3 from Dublin asking for im- +mediate criticism, because the sonnet had to go to Majorca. +'I ask your opinion of a sonnet written to order on the +occasion of the first feast since his canonisation proper of +St. Alphonsus Rodriguez, a laybrother of our Order, who +for 40 years acted as hall porter to the College of Palma +in Majorca; he was, it is believed, much favoured by God +with heavenly light and much persecuted by evil spirits. +The sonnet (I say it snorting) aims at being intelligible.' +And on Oct. 9, '88, 'I am obliged for your criticisms, "con- +tents of which noted", indeed acted on. I have improved +the sestet. . . . (He defends 'hew') ... at any rate +whatever is markedly featured in stone or what is like +stone is most naturally said to be hewn, and to _shape_, +itself, means in old English to hew and the Hebrew _bara_ +to create, even, properly means to hew. But life and +living things are not naturally said to be hewn: they grow, +and their growth is by trickling increment. . . . The (first) +line now stands "Glory is a flame off exploit, so we say ".' + +50. 'JUSTUS ES, &c. Jer. xii. 1 (for title), March 17,'89.' +Autograph in A.--Similar autograph in B, which reads +line 9, _Sir, life on thy great cause_. Text from A, which +seems the later, being written in the peculiar faint ink of +the corrections in B, and embodying them.--Early drafts +in H. + +51. 'To R. B. April 22, '89.' Autograph in A. This, the last +poem sent to me, came on April 29.--No other copy, but +the working drafts in H.--In line 6 the word _moulds_ was +substituted by me for _combs_ of original, when the sonnet +was published by Miles; and I leave it, having no doubt +that G. M. H. would have made some such alteration. + +52. 'SUMMA.' This poem had, I believe, the ambitious design +which its title suggests. What was done of it was destroyed, +with other things, when he joined the Jesuits. My copy +is a contemporary autograph of 16 lines, written when he +was still an undergraduate; I give the first four. A. + +53. _What being_. Two scraps in H. I take the apparently later +one, and have inserted the comma in line 3. + +54. 'ON THE PORTRAIT, &c. Monastereven, Co. Kildare, +Christmas, '86.' Autograph with full title, no corrections, +in A. Early drafts in H. + +55. _The sea took pity_. Undated pencil scrap in H. + +56. ASHBOUGHS (my title). In H in two versions; first as +a curtal sonnet (like 13 and 22) on same sheet with the +four sonnets 44-47, and preceding them: second, an +apparently later version in the same metre on a page by +itself; with expanded variation from seventh line, making +thirteen lines for eleven. I print the whole of this second +MS., and have put brackets to show what I think would +make the best version of the poem: for if the bracketed +words were omitted the original curtal sonnet form would +be preserved and carry the good corrections. The uncom- +fortable _eye_ in the added portion was perhaps to be worked +as a vocative referring to first line (?). + +57. _Hope holds_. In H, a torn undated scrap which carries +a vivid splotch of local colour.--line 4, a variant has +_A growing burnish brighter than_. + +58. ST. WINEFRED. G. M. H. began a tragedy on St. Winefred +Oct. '79, for which he subsequently wrote the chorus, +No. 36, above. He was at it again in 1881, and had +mentioned the play in his letters, and when, some years +later, I determined to write my _Feast of Bacchus_ in six- +stressed verse, I sent him a sample of it, and asked him to +let me see what he had made of the measure. The MS. +which he sent me, April 1, 1885, was copied, and that +copy is the text in this book, from A, the original not +being discoverable. It may therefore contain copyist's +errors. Twenty years later, when I was writing my +_Demeter_ for the lady-students at Somerville College, I re- +membered the first line of Caradoc's soliloquy, and made +some use of it. On the other hand the broken line _I have +read her eyes_ in my 1st part of _Nero_ is proved by date to +be a coincidence, and not a reminiscence.--Caradoc was +to 'die impenitent, struck by the finger of God'. + +59. _What shall I do_. Sent me in a letter with his own melody +and a note on the poem. 'This is not final of course. +Perhaps the name of England is too exclusive.' Date +Clongower, Aug. 1885. A. + +60. _The times are nightfall_. Revised and corrected draft in H. +The first two lines are corrected from the original opening +in old syllabic verse: + + The times are nightfall and the light grows less; + The times are winter and a world undone; + +61. 'CHEERY BEGGAR.' Undated draft with much correction, +in H. Text is the outcome. + +62 and 63. These are my interpretation of the intention of some +unfinished disordered verses on a sheet of paper in H. In +63, line 1, _furl_ is I think unmistakable: an apparently +rejected earlier version had _Soft childhood's carmine +dew-drift down_. + +64. 'THE WOODLARK.' Draft on one sheet of small notepaper +in H. Fragments in some disorder: the arrangement of +them in the text satisfies me. The word _sheath_ is +printed for _sheaf_ of MS., and _sheaf_ recurs in correc- +tions. Dating of July 5, '76. + +65. 'MOONRISE. June 19, 1876.' H. Note at foot shows +intention to rewrite with one stress more in the second +half of each line, and the first is thus rewritten 'in the +white of the dusk, in the walk of the morning'. + +66. CUCKOO. From a scrap in H without date or title. + +67. It being impossible to satisfy myself I give this MS. in +facsimile as an example, after p. 92. + +68. _The child is father_. From a newspaper cutting with another +very poor comic triolet sent me by G. M. H. They are +signed _BRAN_. His comic attempts were not generally so +successful as this is. + +69. _The shepherd's brow_. In H. Various consecutive full +drafts on the same sheet as 51, and date April 3, '89. +The text is what seems to be the latest draft: it has no +corrections. Thus its date is between 50 and 51. It +might be argued that this sonnet has the same right to be +recognised as a finished poem with the sonnets 44-47, but +those had several years recognition whereas this must have +been thrown off one day in a cynical mood, which he +could not have wished permanently to intrude among his +last serious poems. + +70. 'TO HIS WATCH.' H. On a sheet by itself; apparently +a fair copy with corrections embodied in this text, except +that the original 8th line, which is not deleted, is preferred +to the alternative suggestion, _Is sweetest comfort's carol +or worst woe's smart_. + +71. _Strike, churl_. H, on same page with a draft of part of +No. 45.--l. 4, _Have at_ is a correction for _aim at_.--This +scrap is some evidence for the earlier dating of the four +sonnets. + +72. 'EPITHALAMION.' Four sides of pencilled rough sketches, +and five sides of quarto first draft, on 'Royal University +of Ireland' candidates paper, as if G. M. H. had written +it while supervising an examination. Fragments in disorder +with erasures and corrections; undated. H.--The text, +which omits only two disconnected lines, is my arrange- +ment of the fragments, and embodies the latest corrections. +It was to have been an Ode on the occasion of his brother's +marriage, which fixes the date as 1888. It is mentioned +in a letter of May 25, whence the title comes.--I have +printed _dene_ for _dean_ (in two places). In l. 9 of poem +cover = covert, which should be in text, as G. M. H. never +spelt phonetically.--l. 11, _of_ may be _at_, MS. uncertain.-- +page 90, line 16, _shoots_ is, I think, a noun. + +73. _Thee, God, I come from_. Unfinished draft in H. Undated, +probably '85, on same sheet with first draft of No. 38.-- +l. 2, _day long_. MS. as two words with accent on _day_.-- +l. 17, above the words _before me_ the words _left with me_ +are written as alternative, but text is not deleted. All the +rest of this hymn is without question. In l. 19, _Yea_ is +right. After the verses printed in text there is some +versified _credo_ intended to form part of the complete +poem; thus: + + Jesus Christ sacrificed + On the cross. . . . + Moulded, he, in maiden's womb, + Lived and died and from the tomb + Rose in power and is our + Judge that comes to deal our doom. + +74. _To him who_. Text is an underlined version among working +drafts in H.--line 6, _freed_ = got rid of, banished. This sense +of the word is obsolete; it occurs twice in Shakespeare, +cp. Cymb. III. vi. 79, 'He wrings at some distress . . . +would I could free 't!'. + + + +FINIS + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins, by +Gerard Manley Hopkins + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK POEMS OF GERARD MANLEY HOPKINS *** + +***** This file should be named 22403.txt or 22403.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/2/4/0/22403/ + +Produced by Lewis Jones + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +http://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at http://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit http://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. diff --git a/22403.zip b/22403.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..4c8fa95 --- /dev/null +++ b/22403.zip diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..381806e --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #22403 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/22403) |