Nature

The Starlight Night

by Gerard Manley Hopkins 1844–1889

From Poems (1918)

Nature

LOOK at the stars! look, look up at the skies!
O look at all the fire-folk sitting in the air!
The bright boroughs, the circle-citadels there!
Down in dim woods the diamond delves! the elves'-eyes!
The grey lawns cold where gold, where quickgold lies!
Wind-beat whitebeam! airy abeles set on a flare!
Flake-doves sent floating forth at a farmyard scare!--
Ah well! it is all a purchase, all is a prize.

Buy then! bid then!--What?--Prayer, patience, alms,
vows.
Look, look: a May-mess, like on orchard boughs!
Look! March-bloom, like on mealed-with-yellow
sallows!
These are indeed the barn; withindoors house
The shocks. This piece-bright paling shuts the spouse
Christ home, Christ and his mother and all his hallows.

MLA

Hopkins, Gerard Manley. “The Starlight Night.” Poetry Codex, poetrycodex.com/poem/hopkins/7/.

Chicago

Hopkins, Gerard Manley. “The Starlight Night.” Poetry Codex. https://poetrycodex.com/poem/hopkins/7/.

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