| Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844–89). Poems. 1918. |
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| 32. Spelt from Sibyl’s Leaves |
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| EARNEST, earthless, equal, attuneable, ' vaulty, voluminous, … stupendous | |
| Evening strains to be tíme’s vást, ' womb-of-all, home-of-all, hearse-of-all night. | |
| Her fond yellow hornlight wound to the west, ' her wild hollow hoarlight hung to the height | |
| Waste; her earliest stars, earl-stars, ' stárs principal, overbend us, | |
| Fíre-féaturing heaven. For earth ' her being has unbound, her dapple is at an end, as- | 5 |
| tray or aswarm, all throughther, in throngs; ' self ín self steedèd and páshed—qúite | |
| Disremembering, dísmémbering ' áll now. Heart, you round me right | |
| With: Óur évening is over us; óur night ' whélms, whélms, ánd will end us. | |
| Only the beak-leaved boughs dragonish ' damask the tool-smooth bleak light; black, | |
| Ever so black on it. Óur tale, O óur oracle! ' Lét life, wáned, ah lét life wind | 10 |
| Off hér once skéined stained véined variety ' upon, áll on twó spools; párt, pen, páck | |
| Now her áll in twó flocks, twó folds—black, white; ' right, wrong; reckon but, reck but, mind | |
| But thése two; wáre of a wórld where bút these ' twó tell, each off the óther; of a rack | |
| Where, selfwrung, selfstrung, sheathe- and shelterless, ' thóughts agaínst thoughts ín groans grínd. | |
| | | See Notes. |
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