 Photo: Esther Dobson 'Pied Beauty' by Gerard Manley Hopkins 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. Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844–1889) was an English poet and a Jesuit priest.
0 Comments
 A nunnery grave, Isle of Iona, Scotland (Photo: Carina Postolache) 'The Strange Guest' by Alfred Noyes You cannot leave a new house With any open door, But a strange guest will enter it And never leave it more. Build it on a waste land, Dreary as a sin. Leave her but a broken gate And Beauty will come in. Build it all of scarlet brick, Work your wicked will. Dump it on an ash-heap, Then--O then, be still. Sit and watch your new house Leave an open door. A strange guest will enter it And never leave it more. She will make your raw wood Mellower than gold. She will take your new lamps And sell them for old. She will crumble all your pride, Break your folly down. Much that you rejected She will bless and crown. She will rust your naked roof, Split your pavement through, Dip her brush in sun and moon And colour it anew. Leave her but a window Wide to wind and rain, You shall find her footstep When you come again. Though she keep you waiting Many months or years, She shall stain and make it Beautiful with tears. She shall hurt and heal it, Soften it and save, Blessing it, until it stand Stronger than the grave. You cannot leave a new house With any open door, But a strange guest will enter it And never leave it more. Alfred Noyes (1880–1958) was an English poet.
 Photo: Justin Thompson 'God's Grandeur' by Gerard Manley Hopkins 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. Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844–1889) was an English poet and a Jesuit priest.
 Lake Windermere, UK (Photo: Amiel Osmaston) 'This Is My Father's World' by Maltbie D. Babcock This is my Father’s world, And to my listening ears All nature sings, and round me rings The music of the spheres. This is my Father’s world: I rest me in the thought Of rocks and trees, of skies and seas; His hand the wonders wrought. This is my Father’s world, The birds their carols raise, The morning light, the lily white, Declare their maker’s praise. This is my Father’s world: He shines in all that’s fair; In the rustling grass I hear Him pass; He speaks to me everywhere. This is my Father’s world. O let me ne’er forget That though the wrong Seems oft so strong, God is the ruler yet. This is my Father’s world: The battle is not done: Jesus who died shall be satisfied, And earth and Heav’n be one. This is my Father’s world, Dreaming, I see His face. I ope my eyes, and in glad surprise Cry, The Lord is in this place. This is my Father’s world, From the shining courts above, The Beloved One, His Only Son, Came—a pledge of deathless love. This is my Father’s world, Should my heart be ever sad? The Lord is King—let the heavens ring. God reigns—let the earth be glad. This is my Father’s world. Now closer to Heaven bound, For dear to God is the earth Christ trod. No place but is holy ground. This is my Father’s world. I walk a desert lone. In a bush ablaze to my wondering gaze God makes His glory known. This is my Father’s world, A wanderer I may roam; Whate’er my lot, it matters not, My heart is still at home. Maltbie D. Babcock (1858–1901) was an American pastor.
 Yachats, Oregon (Photo: Carole Spencer) 'The Kingdom of God' by Edna Dean Proctor Through storm and sun the age draws on When Heaven and earth shall meet, For the Lord has said that glorious He will make the place of His feet; And the grass may die on the summer hills, The flower fade by the river, But our God is the same through endless years, And His word shall stand forever. And they shall meet in love that knows Nor race nor creed nor clime, For the world shall be one brotherhood In that celestial time; And happiness shall be the air, And righteousness the sod, And earth go singing on her way About the throne of God! "What of the night?" O Watchman set To mark dawn's earliest ray: "The wind blows fair from the morning star, Fair from the gates of day; And over sorrow and sighing shines The Dream of Galilee-- The Kingdom of God that shall fill the earth As the waters fill the sea." Edna Dean Proctor (1829–1923) was an American author and poet.
 Moonlight Beach, California (Photo: Jon Seligman) 'The Kingdom of God' by Francis Thompson O world invisible, we view thee, O world intangible, we touch thee, O world unknowable, we know thee, Inapprehensible, we clutch thee! Does the fish soar to find the ocean, The eagle plunge to find the air-- That we ask of the stars in motion If they have rumor of thee there? Not where the wheeling systems darken, And our benumbed conceiving soars!-- The drift of pinions, would we hearken, Beats at our own clay-shuttered doors. The angels keep their ancient places-- Turn but a stone and start a wing! 'Tis ye, 'tis your estrangèd faces, That miss the many-splendored thing. But (when so sad thou canst not sadder) Cry--and upon thy so sore loss Shall shine the traffic of Jacob's ladder Pitched betwixt Heaven and Charing Cross. Yea, in the night, my Soul, my daughter, Cry--clinging to Heaven by the hems; And lo, Christ walking on the water, Not of Genesareth, but Thames! Francis Thompson (1859–1907) was an English and Catholic poet.
 Snowdrops in Cumbria, England (Photo: Amiel Osmaston) 'The Kingdom' by R. S. Thomas It’s a long way off but inside it There are quite different things going on: Festivals at which the poor man Is king and the consumptive is Healed; mirrors in which the blind look At themselves and love looks at them Back; and industry is for mending The bent bones and the minds fractured By life. It’s a long way off, but to get There takes no time and admission Is free, if you purge yourself Of desire, and present yourself with Your need only and the simple offering Of your faith, green as a leaf. R. S. Thomas (1913–2000) was a Welsh poet and Anglican priest.
 Halemaʻumaʻu Crater, Kīlauea, Big Island, Hawaiʻi (Photo: Alex Selarque) I took this photo in 2016 on the Big Island of Hawaiʻi during a field trip with my photography students. This is the Halemaʻumaʻu Crater on Kīlauea as part of an ongoing eruption that continues to this day. - AS
 Sunrise over Morcambe Bay from Grange-over-Sands, Cumbria (UK) (Photo: Esther Dobson)  Grieg-French-Bell Trail, Humboldt Redwoods State Park, California (Photo: Sam Seligman) Standing in the redwood grove, I am awed by the heavenly streaks pouring through the forest, and the silence is deafening. - SS
|
Categories
All
ForecastSupport Us
Archives
February 2025
|
RSS Feed