Sandstone textures, Kilwining Abbey

Sculpted by the winds, the ruined walls of the abbey still portray a beauty.

 

God's Grandeur

 

 

The world is charged with the grandeur of God.

It will flame out, like shining

from shook foil;

It gathers to a greatness,

like the ooze of oil

Crushed. Why do men then now

not reck his rod?

Generations have trod, have trod,

have trod;

And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;

And wears man's smudge and shares man's smell: the soil

Is bare now, nor can foot feel,

being shod.

 

And for all this, nature is never spent;

There lives the dearest freshness

deep down things;

And though the last lights

off the black West went

Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs --

Because the Holy Ghost over the bent

World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.

 

Gerard Manley Hopkins

 

Done