GLORY be to God for dappled things,
For skies of couple-color 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.
–Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844-1889)
As a personal challenge to my readers, when and where you get a chance today consider printing this and reading it out loud–KSH.
Thanks, Kendall. A dose of Hopkins gets the day off to a very good start.
Ahhhhh – Hopkins does put things into proper order, doesn’t he?
Awesome.
Always been one of my favorite poems!!
Absolutely marvelous words!
Love, love LOVE, it! Especially as the mother of a freckled, speckled boy. Thanks for posting this, Kendall. You started me loving this poet when you posted “As Kingishers Catch Fire” several years ago. It became one of my favorites and I have shared it many times.
Thank you for your sermon Sunday; it gave me much food for thought. – pam
I love this poem. I consider it to be a memorial to my favorite dog, all speckled and humped and physically unlovely, but the most lovely of dog hearts ever.
I had this on a sticky on my computer for many years.