Brooding Everlasting

Brooding, photoshopped church!
Work-place of the poet-priest!
In the words of a prayer, he urged
how he loved Jesus best:



"O Deus, ego amo te.
O God, I love thee, I love thee--
not out of hope of heaven for me,
nor fearing not to love and be."

So the convert-priest praised He
who was spat on, under brooding skies,
"for my sake sufferedst nails, and lance,
mocked and marred countenance."

Hopkins' words described the faith
of St. Francis, so expressing both
the saint's self-knowledge and his own,
the beliefs he felt in his bones.

Christopher T. George

St. Francis Xavier Church, Liverpool by Derek Hyamson.
Gerard Manley Hopkins served as part of the parish
staff for two years in 1880-1.

"O Deus, ego amo te"
translated by Gerard Manley Hopkins, S.J.