Saturday, September 24, 2011

LOVELY IN EYES NOT HIS

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 gráce: 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.
 ~by Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844-1889) an English poet, a Jesuit priest, known for his "sprung rhythm" in his poetry, with beautiful images of faith, Christ and a sense of divine wonder sprinkled throughout his writings. In 1975, a floor stone was placed in his memory in Poet's Corner in Westminster Abbey, alongside the greatest poets of the English people. 

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