Thursday, January 19, 2017

Like Shining From Shook Foil




We've had a lot of rain here in Los Angeles the last month or so, and everything is greener than it's been in over five years. The sun glints off of green. I almost fell down into this patch of grass when I was out walking our dog this afternoon. I imagined myself face down and buried, lush. Lush. That's one of my favorite words. There's something sexy about it, about lushness. Something that gives me a frisson.

Love never dies. It just goes underground, a boy I loved a long time ago told me.



Grass. Green. Lush. Frisson




God's Grandeur


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)

5 comments:

  1. I am glad you are finally, finally gettting rain. It's been a long haul for you.

    There are so many spiritual comparisons with rain. Unfortunately I can't think of any right now. But I am still glad for your rain.

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  2. I can imagine you face down and buried too...hahaha, but I know you would be happy - so that's OK.

    "there lives the dearest freshness deep down things" such a lovely thought.

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  3. What a poem, that line you used as the title of this post especially.

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