Holy Week–Maundy Thursday

March 20, 2008 — Kristine

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 Resurrection,
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.

–Gerard Manley Hopkins (the Great)

Posted in Mormon. 4 Comments »

4 Responses to “Holy Week–Maundy Thursday”

  1. Kevinf Says:
    March 20, 2008 at 10:06 am

    Hopkins, indeed the Great!

    One of my favorite poems, Thou Art Indeed Just, Lord, ends with this great line:

    …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.

    Thank you, Kristine.

  2. Kevin Barney Says:
    March 20, 2008 at 12:14 pm

    In case anyone wants to know what “Maundy” Thursday is, see this from the Online Etymological Dictionary:

    1440, from M.E. maunde “the Last Supper,” also “ceremony of washing the feet,” from O.Fr. mandé, from L. mandatum “commandment,” in reference to the opening words of the church service for this day, Mandatum novum do vobis “A new commandment I give unto you” (John xiii.34), words supposedly spoken by Jesus to the Apostles after washing their feet at the Last Supper.

  3. Ann Says:
    March 21, 2008 at 6:46 pm

    Thank you, Kristine. Hopkins was my dear friend Peggy Rogers’s favorite poet. She died last November, sure of no afterlife, and wistful for the remainder of the life that she would not be living. No reading books to her grandchildren for Peggy.

    Maybe she was wrong.

  4. Mary L. Bradford Says:
    March 27, 2008 at 10:45 am

    I am so happy that a poet is taking Dialogue, and a Haglund, a family I love having become acquained with them in Arlington VA. Kristine, please count on me in any way you can see fit even though I am gently aging here. The shade of Gene England also rejoices, I fel ceertain. He longed to see Dialogue in the hnds of “the Youth.” But an experienced, thinking youth. Thanks you! Thanks you, Molly, and Dialogue’s wonderful Board of Editors who lift burdens off the shoulders of the editor.


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