Carrion Comfort

“Carrion Comfort” was the first poem I came across from Gerard Manley Hopkins, a Victorian era poet, whom has become one of my favorites. This poem is written in the form of a Petrarchan or Italian sonnet. The form of these sonnets follow a certain patter; he first eight lines pose a problem or a question while the last six lines offer the solution or answer. Rather than offering you my interpretation of the poem, I want to give you the opportunity to wrestle with and meditate on this wonderful poem. I hope it blesses you!

Carrion Comfort by Gerard Manley Hopkins

Not, I'll not, carrion comfort, Despair, not feast on thee;
Not untwist — slack they may be — these last strands of man
In me ór, most weary, cry I can no more. I can;
Can something, hope, wish day come, not choose not to be.
But ah, but O thou terrible, why wouldst thou rude on me
Thy wring-world right foot rock? lay a lionlimb against me? scan
With darksome devouring eyes my bruisèd bones? and fan,
O in turns of tempest, me heaped there; me frantic to avoid thee and flee?

Why? That my chaff might fly; my grain lie, sheer and clear.
Nay in all that toil, that coil, since (seems) I kissed the rod,
Hand rather, my heart lo! lapped strength, stole joy, would laugh, chéer.
Cheer whom though? the hero whose heaven-handling flung me, fóot tród
Me? or me that fought him? O which one? is it each one? That night, that year
Of now done darkness I wretch lay wrestling with (my God!) my God.