As Kingfishers Catch Fire

A Dense Mound of Wound Sound

A Gerard Manley Hopkins poem is about as distinctive as they come. If you find your tongue twisting up in knots, while at the same time trying to chew on some profound insights into humanity, God, the natural word (or some combination of the three), you're likely in Hopkins territory. He's not trying to make things difficult, though. Hopkins loved language, which meant that he loved pushing it to the limit to see what it was capable of. Just check out "Pied Beauty," "The Windhover," and "Spring and Fall" for more examples.