Gerard Manley Hopkins has this wonderful gem of a sonnet called "The Windhover." The first time I read it I thought: here's a poet after my own heart. The gist of it is the poet glimpses a falcon soaring off in the distance one morning, and sees in its beauty and freedom an analogy for Christ. That's the gist, but the poem is as much about the aural experience as the cerebral: read it with the ear.
The Windhover
for Christ our Lord
I caught this morning morning’s minion, king-
dom of daylight’s dauphin, dapple-dawn-drawn Falcon, in his riding
Of the rolling level underneath him steady air, and striding
High there, how he rung upon the reign of a wimpling wing
In his ecstasy! then off, off forth on swing,
As a skate’s heel sweeps smooth on a bow-bend: the hurl and gliding
Rebuffed the big wind. My heart in hiding
Stirred for a bird,-- the achieve of; the mastery of the thing!
Brute beauty and valour and act, oh, air, pride, plume, here
Buckle! AND the fire that breaks from thee then, a billion
Times told lovelier, more dangerous, O my chevalier!
No wonder of it: sheer plod makes plough down sillion
Shine, and blue-break embers, ah my dear,
Fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermillion.
Speaking of aural experiences, about two years ago I was plunking away at a chord progression on my guitar with "The Windhover" floating on the horizon of my mind. Here's the song that eventually emerged out of this musical conversation with Hopkins (click here to listen).
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