{"id":2951,"date":"2019-03-11T00:00:29","date_gmt":"2019-03-11T04:00:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/mission-and-identity\/?p=2951"},"modified":"2019-09-18T16:44:54","modified_gmt":"2019-09-18T20:44:54","slug":"march-11-gerard-manley-hopkins-sj-there-lives-the-dearest-freshness-deep-down-things","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/2019\/03\/11\/march-11-gerard-manley-hopkins-sj-there-lives-the-dearest-freshness-deep-down-things\/","title":{"rendered":"March 11 – Gerard Manley Hopkins, sj – – “there lives the dearest freshness deep down things”"},"content":{"rendered":"

Monday, March 11, 2019\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cBecause the Holy Ghost over the bent
\nWorld broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.\u201d<\/p>\n

Often when I wake, sometime between 5:30 and 7:00, I pick up my iPhone 8 and whisper \u201cweather\u201d to it and wait for its modest trove of predictions for the day; \u00a0later at my laptop, I stretch weather capacity with\u00a0Weather.com<\/a>\u00a0on my laptop\u2019s larger screen. But the 8\u2019s first look invites my eyes out the window looking West and sometimes my next move is to open my window and lean out into the weather and the soft sounds of morning traffic on Livernois. \u00a0Today, though, the 8 confused me. \u00a0Clear all day it told me even though the sky was dull gray instead of the dawn sunlight kissing the tops of the trees in the yard.<\/p>\n

It only took a few minutes to solve that riddle – – – > \u00a0Daylight savings time, \u00a0of course! My body is up when the earth, rather than clocks, treats me to early dawn, no traces yet of its first bright touches on the trees. \u00a0 Some research tell us that traffic accidents increase c. 6% on this day; losing an hour of what your body had come to expect as normal sleep time dulls the senses and makes for driver errors \u2014 about 6% more of them than last week or probably next week.<\/p>\n

Why these ruminations about sleep and sunrise took me to one of my deepest poems from one of my most beloved poets I am not sure. \u00a0Doesn\u2019t matter. \u00a0It would be hard to find more sheer linguistic beauty than Gerard Manley Hopkins celebration of the earth as a dwelling place of God.<\/p>\n

Best to read the poet out loud, with pauses, \u00a0several times. \u00a0Perhaps as a moment of gladness and gratitude for an open sky that traces its finger tips across Livernois and caresses my city. \u00a0 \u00a0Yours too, I hope.<\/p>\n

Have a blest week.<\/p>\n

john sj<\/p>\n

Today\u2019s Post: \u00a0 Gerard Manley Hopkins, sj \u00a0\u201cGod\u2019s Grandeur\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

The world is charged with the grandeur of God.
\nIt will flame out, like shining from shook foil;
\nIt gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil
\nCrushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod?
\nGenerations have trod, have trod, have trod;
\nAnd all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;<\/p>\n

And wears man\u2019s smudge and shares man\u2019s smell: the soil
\nIs bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.<\/p>\n

And for all this, nature is never spent;
\nThere lives the dearest freshness deep down things;
\nAnd though the last lights off the black West went
\nOh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs \u2014
\nBecause the Holy Ghost over the bent
\nWorld broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.<\/p>\n

Gerard Manley Hopkins \u00a028 July 1844 \u2013 8 June, 1889<\/p>\n

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Monday, March 11, 2019\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cBecause the Holy Ghost over the bent World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.\u201d Often when I wake, sometime between 5:30 and 7:00, I pick up my iPhone 8 and whisper \u201cweather\u201d to … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":139,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[11641],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2951"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/139"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2951"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2951\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2952,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2951\/revisions\/2952"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2951"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2951"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2951"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}