poetry

I’ve always been a lover of fiction, and only in the last 3 or 4 years have I come to a place where I can not only teach poetry but also enjoy it. The majority of my students in literature surveys are put off by poetry (as I was, even in grad school), so I have had some hesitation in posting a poem here. This summer, I’ve been teaching British and Irish Literature II (which covers the late 1700’s to the present), and I’ve been reacquainted with some poems and poets that I love. In particular I’m drawn to Gerard Manley Hopkins, a Jesuit in Victorian England who wrote so eloquently about his faith. A number of his poems speak to his struggles with doubt, but he has others that celebrate God and creation. “As kingfishers catch fire” has been on my mind since mid-June: when I read it one morning before class, it stunned me (more about why after the poem).

[Teaching aside: let me make a few suggestions to all of you who are not poetry readers. First, read it aloud. Poetry is in part about sound, and this is especially true of Hopkins. You miss much of the beauty of his work if you don’t hear it. Second, ignore the accent marks (Í) and line breaks and just read straight through as you would with prose, pausing and stopping with the punctuation; it’s a lot easier to get the sense of the poem that way.]

As kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame;
As tumbled over rim and roundy wells
Stones ring; like each tucked string tells, each hung bell’s
Bow swung finds tongue to fling out broad its name;
Each mortal thing does one thing and the same:
Deals out that being indoors each one dwells;
Selves–goes itself; myself it speaks and spells,
Crying What I do is me: for that I came.

Í say more: the just man justices;
Keeps gráce: thát keeps all his goings graces;
Acts in God’s eye what in God’s eye he is–
Chríst. For Christ plays in ten thousand places,
Lovely in limbs, and lovely in eyes not his
To the Father through the features of men’s faces.

I have to say, I’m still left rather breathless each time I read it. Perhaps it’s because I’ve fumbled for so long to know who I am and what I’m all about; only in the last 6 or 7 years have I truly come to know myself. As I’ve understood that God created me to do not just something but certain things, that I was created for a particular purpose, I have come to see that I don’t just teach for a living, I am a teacher. I don’t just like to write, I am a writer. “What I do is me: for that I came.”

It’s all well and good to know your purpose. Hopkins take this one step further, though. He says that as the “just man justices” and the writer writes, he “Acts in God’s eye what in God’s eye he is–Christ.” When I am truly me, being myself (and doing what I was made to do), I am Christ, giving pleasure to the Father. It’s good to be reminded that I was made for a purpose and that who I am makes my Creator happy.

Note: for those of you, like me, unfamiliar with the kingfisher, this is what he looks like; you can learn more here.

Tagged as: calling, Christ, Gerard Manley Hopkins, identity, kingfisher, poetry, purpose