Gerard Manley Hopkins

Hopkins wrote, and I read, rapt.
His clanging church-bell words,
The splashing torrent that they proved
To be, brought life to an expired art form,
Floating in formaldehyde. One hundred
Years, at least, of “thous” and “thees,”
And clonking, club-foot rhymes
Had been the death of poetry.
It lived again when Hopkins lived.
Alas, the clanging and the spray
Diminished when the man had gone,
And poetry again is lifeless, floating
In a jar.



Poetry by Lawrence Beck The PoetBay support member heart!
Read 233 times
Written on 2018-12-08 at 20:23

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