I wanted to share with you guys one of my favorite poems by my favorite poet, GM Hopkins. The poem is called "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.”
Everything these days seems to bring my thoughts to Africa. The hope embodied in this poem speaks to all Humanity, but it has a special message to a continent of such terrible corruption and pain. Even though man trods, and trods, and trods, trying to smudge up the presence of God in this world, it is in vain. The crushing attempts of man just squeezes out the beauty of God, like when oil is pressed out of an olive. His redemption will "[gather] to a greatness, like the ooze of oil crushed" and "flame out," for though it seems bleak for Africa, 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."
Jesus we look for your dawn over Africa. Come to this bent world; give us your renewing presence!