Joanne: Hello, I’m Joanne Diaz. Abram: And I’m Abram Van Engen. Joanne: And this is Poetry For All. Abram: And today, I have an announcement to make. Joanne: What is that, Abram? Abram: I wrote a book. Joanne: Yes! Again, yet again, you have written a book. This guy. Tell us what the book is about. Abram: Okay, okay. This book is called Word Made Fresh, and it’s an invitation to explore and it's an exploration of poetry through the eyes of faith. Joanne: Okay, so say more about where this book originated. How did you decide to create such a book? Abram: Okay so here’s the deal, this podcast is called “Poetry for All”, and it really is for all. It’s for everyone, anyone, any perspective. All sorts of poems, all sorts of poets. But I also, as part of my gig in this world, I teach poetry in churches on Sunday mornings quite frequently. And so what this book is about is doing that, and it’s intended primarily for our listeners to happen to be people of faith, and what I do is I talk about how poetry works from the point of view of faith. That is, why does the Christian tradition repeatedly ask us to think about poetry and invite us into it? So, it's a book about poetry and faith for anyone who might be interested in any of those connections. Joanne: That sounds amazing. I love it. And why are you announcing it today? Abram: Well, it's out. You can pre-order it, it comes out soon. So if you're listening to this and it's past June 2024, you can get it right now. But if you're listening to this and it's not yet June, you could pre-order it. Joanne: So, Abram, do you know what I do whenever a student comes to my office and says they want to declare the English major? I have a little bell from when my husband ran a marathon and I run up and down the hallway of the English department and I ring it. So, I'm going to do that right now. [enthusiastic bell jangling] Abram has a new book! Go buy it! It's called The Word Made Fresh and can you tell these people where they can find the book? Abram: Anywhere, I mean your bookstore, Amazon, whatever you do for books. Joanne: Yeah, that's great. Well, congratulations, I'm so excited. And this poem that we're going to read and discuss today is in that book, right? Abram: It's not only in that book, it's the poem that starts off the whole book, and it's the poem that illustrates the cover of the book. And the reason for that is because the poem we're about to read today is really the poem that most got me into poetry and started me down this whole track. Joanne: Wow. Oh my God, that's amazing. So this is Gerard Manley Hopkins's poem “As Kingfishers Catch Fire”. Would you be willing to read it for us? Abram: Happy to do so. “As Kingfishers Catch Fire”. [To read the poem, visit this website: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44389/as-kingfishers-catch-fire] Joanne: Wow, that is such a great poem and you read it so well. I just love the way you read the poems. It's so declarative and authoritative and amazed. You have a wonderful tone when you read poems. Abram: Well, thank you. Joanne: No, I mean it and I love that this poem has so much meaning for you and I wonder if we could talk about meeting because, you know, upon first listen or read of this poem it's a bit confounding if I may say so. Abram: Yeah, when I read this poem in churches on a Sunday morning I get a lot of blank stares. Joanne: Well, we're still trying to wake up. I mean, we're all a little bleary-eyed on a Sunday morning when you throw this at us. So where do you even begin? Walk us through this. Abram: So I'll say that the reason this poem was sort of the door into poetry for me is because when I read this poem for the first time, when I heard this poem for the first time, the whole point of it became a little bit clearer to me, that is the point of poetry, which is say, it isn't about a pure message wrapped up in garbly language. Instead, it's about beautiful or interesting or inviting or compelling language that, then, is also doing something else. In other words it's about the experience of language itself. So one of the things you think about with this poem is that the meaning does matter to this poem and we'll get there, but the first thing to think about is what did you actually make of the music of the poem? And Hopkins is so driven by the music of words and language. So much of this poetry is just playing with the sound of language, and this poem is doing exactly that. And so I love this quote by Matthew Zapruder, he's a poet as well, and he says “the usefulness of poetry has less to do with delivering messages which we can just as easily get from prose and far more to do with what poems can do to engage our language re enlivening and reactivating it, and thereby drawing us into a different form of attention and awareness.” Oh, that's beautiful. And so even as I was listening to you, and I love that quote from Matthew Zapruder, that's so insightful. Can we start with the title? You know, I just read a book called The Nature Fix which came out a few years ago. It's by Florence Williams and it's all about how divorced we are from the natural world throughout many hours of each day and how it has such detrimental effects on our mental and physical health. As a result, I think there was a time, during Hopkins time for sure and certainly from millennia before that, where if you ask someone what a kingfisher was they probably would know. I didn't know what a kingfisher was until I looked up an image on Google, and now I'm seeing this image of a beautiful little bird with a long beak and a beautiful bright orange breast. So is that the fire? When he says “As kingfishers catch fire” is he talking about that beautiful orange color that looks like a flame on the bird? Abram: So he's talking about these incredibly beautiful, really bright and colorful birds that hover over the water because they are fishers. They hover over the water and then in a moment they sort of explode and dive into the water to fish. And so as they catch fire, the way I imagine or the way I picture the beginning of this poem is the poet is just basically wandering around a lake probably around sunset. so if you could picture that scene you got these birds hovering over the water that are just exploding with light as they dive into the water to fish. And the dragonflies, too, are drawing the flame of the sun as they hover over the water. All of these creatures are drawing that light into themselves as they do what they do that makes them what they are. Joanne: That's helpful because, I think, then, the way into this poem is to understand that the sound and image are driving so much of the work and energy of the poem that sometimes you have to fill in a word or two here and there because he's compressed the language so much. I think if you wanted to read the first line this way it makes sense: “just as kingfishers catch fire, so too do dragonflies draw flames.” Is that right? Abram: What it is is this description of things in the action of what makes them what they are. So, one way to understand this poem is that the key line happens right at the end of the eighth line. And for those who don't have the poem in front of them, this is a sonnet, it's fourteen lines but it's actually broken into two stanzas so the first eight lines form the first stanza and the eighth line is this “crying what I do is me for that I came” and what Hopkins is basically saying is all things are identified by their actions. What makes them what they are is what they do. And so he's looking at the world around him, and he's describing things by their actions, by what they do. The fishing of the kingfishers, the hovering of the dragonflies in the sunlight. And then in the next couple of lines a stone falls in a well, strings are plucked, a bell is swung and you hear the sound of the bell and so forth. He walks through these things and he says basically what makes a bell a bell? Well, an empty shell casing of metal is not a bell. What makes a bell a bell is the fact that it swings and makes music. That's a bell and it's only about when it does that. Joanne: Just as all of us walking around on planet Earth, we're basically just sacks of meat until we speak. That's when things get interesting, when we become meaning making animals, when we sing, when we make poems so there's a comparison there with the bell isn't there? Abram: Yeah, and one of the things I love about Hopkins is he so often makes the poem do what he is describing and here it's doubly important because if things are what they do, then what makes this poem what it is except what it does? And so take a look at these lines. You can hear the swinging. Imagine a big bell at the top of the tower. And I'm just going to substitute one word for a couple of rhymes that he's got in here. Each GONG hung bell’s GONG bow finds GONG to fling out broad its name. So he's making the gonging swing of that big bell in the sentence itself. “Each hung bell's / Bow swung finds tongue to fling out broad its name’” You can hear that swinging ring of the big bell in those lines. Same thing in the lines before. You can hear the strings being plucked “like each tucked string tells”. You can hear the strings being plucked. And you can even if you listen closely hear the stone echoing down the well when it falls. So here's the echo of the stone. “As tumbled over rim in roundy wells / Stones ring” Joanne: Wow. So every sound choice that he makes is very deliberate and resonant so that then the image of the bell becomes even more powerful, because it isn't just like a beautiful tone or pitch, it's resonant and echoing and it's a sound that keeps going through the poem. Abram: And so these sounds just build on themselves and what I love about that first stanza is you get those sounds compacted into the first four lines, you get the image of the kingfisher and the dragonfly. And then the next four lines you get kind of principle, he builds a principle out of this. So he says “Each mortal thing does one thing and the same” and what he goes on to say is we all do what we are. So everything in the doing of itself, speaks itself. And then it ends with that line “What I do is me: for that I came.” So that's the first eight lines, that's the first. You've got sight and insight, you've got these images and sounds in the first four lines, then you've got this broad principle that spells out what he's learning from that in the next four lines Joanne: “Each mortal thing does one thing and the same / Deals out that being indoors each one dwells” What does that mean? Abram: Welcome to the wild world of Hopkins. Who knows? I mean everybody's got their own version of what that means. Joanne: You are a professor! Abram: I am a professor, so I must have the answers. All right, so let me say this with utter confidence and therefore it will be true. “Deals out that being indoors each one dwells” The idea here, I think, is that what we do in the world is an expression of who we are on the inside. Joanne: Yes, I get it now. I think again you have to insert a word to get the sense of it, but then you have to take the word out in order to enjoy it. So I think it's like “deals out that which usually being indoors then comes out of doors once we enact it from within ourselves” right? Abram: Yeah, that's the way I read it. Joanne: Got it. Okay, but the language is so compressed, so economical, and he's so attentive to the rhythms and the percussion in each line, that he exercises a couple of words there in service of the music. Abram: Yeah, that's exactly right. That's the way I see him doing it, and therefore you know a thing by what it does. So everything in the doing of some action in the world is basically speaking and spelling one thing. It's saying “this is me, this is myself, this is what I am”. Joanne: And then you go to the final sestet or six lines of the sonnet and what do you see happening there? Abram: So we have talked before about how each stanza is a little room, so whenever you have multiple stanzas you have to ask yourself “how does each little room have its own composition and what connects these rooms together?” And this poem, I think, does some really interesting stuff. So, we've talked before about how a sonnet is basically sight and insight or a movement from problem to answer and usually, the problem is the first eight lines and the answer is the next six lines. But we've already seen that he's done both of these movements in the first eight lines, so how can he have six more lines? And I think what he's doing here is he's basically saying I've got this sight and insight in the first eight lines and now the question of the next six lines is “does the same thing apply to human beings? “ Joanne: Yes, and he is also very clear in that first line of the sestet he says “I say more” so there's a principle of addition and inclusion that begins with stanza . Abram: Yeah it's almost like he can't stop himself. It's like I wrote a complete poem, but you know what, I say more. Joanne: Yes, I love it. Okay, good. So then what happens? Abram: So then I think he gets into this question of what it means that actions define things and whether that's true for human beings. And so he says “I say more: the just man justices” and I just love that phrase because, basically what he's saying is, it's like a whole philosophical principle boiled down to four words: “the just man justices”. What he's saying is there's no such thing as justice in the abstract. Justice is where justice is done. Justice is an action in the world so if you want to look for justice you have to look for where justice is happening and therefore justice is more properly a verb than a noun and so he makes it a verb. He says “the just man justices.” That's what makes the person just. Joanne: And this goes to your point about how this is not merely a summary of common sense explanations of things, this is an experience where, wherever he needs language, he will invent it or modify it to suit his needs, to create something surprising and new in the poem. Abram: Absolutely. He's bending language, he's twisting it, he's compacting it, he's doing whatever he needs to do to make the experience ring true and so just as the just man justices, so the person who is filled with grace, the only way to know that is because of their gracious actions in the world keeps grace “that keeps all his goings graces”. Joanne: Yeah, that's really nice. And “Acts in God's eye what in God's eye he is - / Christ - for Christ plays in 10,000 places, / Lovely in limbs, and lovely in eyes not his / To the Father through the features of men's faces” There is a lot of information there. Abram: Yes, there is. So I think everything that we've covered up to this point, anybody could get on board with, find interesting apply to themselves, whatever. The swerve at the end is Christogical, it's theological. This is for all the folks who are invested in the Christ part of this and this is what he's saying. What he's saying (he's a Jesuit priest so this is his worldview) ultimately human beings are called to become what they are and what they are, according to Hopkins, is the image of God. The image of God in Christ. And so there's this great line that St. Augustine back from the fourth Century had about this in which he said, and he's saying this of the Eucharist of the communion, he says “believe what you see, see what you believe and become what you are: the body of Christ.” So become what you already are by your actions in the world. It's basically what Hopkins is saying here. In every act of justice, in every instance of grace, human beings, for Hopkins, take on the face of Christ. They become what they ultimately are, which is the image of God. Joanne: Okay, I'm just going to sit here for a minute. I mean, that's mind-blowing. Whoever you are and whatever your subject position or belief system is, to be told to become what you already are is a very powerful thing to suggest because I think we're told that your life is a journey of self discovery and that you have to search for meaning and this is kind of stopping that. It's like look, no, no, no, just stop, just stop and be the thing you are you already have the equipment to do this. Abram: And what you ultimately are is some form of divinity inside you, I mean that's for Hopkins, that's what he's resting on is that image of God is in you already so become it. Joanne: That's really pretty powerful. Abram: Yeah, so the one other way I always play this out when I teach this poem is it's also a way of saying that no matter where you are, no matter what your job, your occupation, whatever it is you do in the world, the doing of that thing (in justice, in grace) is the doing of the image of God. So there's no prioritizing of one kind of action or one kind of position in the world, one kind of occupation or vocation. They are all each of them the possibilities the places where Christ plays before the Father through the features of all of our faces. Joanne: I find this very moving. I mean, you know by now I'm falling heathen. You know there is no, I'm just so far gone there's no even point in trying to save me but… Abram: That's why we need each other for this podcast. Joanne: See that, it's a symbiosis. I find it very moving to think in those ways about what it is and actually the more I look at that second stanza, the more I see how deliberate we haven't really talked much about his end rhymes but look at what his end rhymes do. It's an a/b a/b a/b sort of end rhyme and it rhymes “justices” “is” “his”. That's interesting. So, in a way, you know, God's justice, justice is his and then “graces” “faces” “places”. That's nice because “graces” is one of the world of the Divine, “places” is 10,000 places all over planet Earth, and then “faces” is so personal, it's so intimate, it's so individuated. I love that it lands on men's faces and looking to the features of men's faces to see the grace of God. Isn't that amazing? Imagine if you were to approach each person, including yourself, but each person with the potential to have an encounter with the grace of God. Abram: Yes, which is exactly what he's putting down in this very compact tight poem. Joanne: And the possibility that kind of sociability could enact the very thing he's commanding us to do, to be in the world, if you were to recognize that grace in another person, that it might help them enact the very thing that's already in them. Isn't that wonderful? Abram: That is wonderful. Joanne: I can see why you like this poem. Abram: Yeah, so to do the poem, to experience the poem, we just have to read the poem again. Joanne: So does that mean you are calling upon me to do so? Abram: Joanne, would you read this poem for us one more time? Joanne: Yes, I'd be delighted to. “As Kingfishers Catch Fire” [conclusive reading of poem] Abram: Love it Joanne: Me too. Boy am I glad you taught me about this poem. So for people who are hearing this episode, we have talked about Gerard Manley Hopkins in another episode from a couple of years ago now for where we focused on pied beauty and I feel really lucky, Abram, that you chose this second poem for us to discuss because with each new poem that I read by him, especially with your guidance, I really I just see how electric he is and I really enjoy that. Abram: Well that's awesome, and thank you all for listening to us and listening to this Hopkins poem, and if you want more information on Hopkins, you can visit our website at poetryforallpod.com. Joanne: And please remember to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. Abram: And we would love a review, so if you like this podcast please leave us a review and share it with a friend. Joanne: And be sure to look for Abram's new book. Again, the title of the book is Word Made Fresh, beautiful collection of poems for anybody who's interested in thinking about that intersection between poetry and faith. Abram: Awesome, thank you all for listening. Joanne: Thank you.