RDB Emmerson's "The Windhover"

“To Christ our Lord

I CAUGHT this morning morning’s minion, king-
dom of daylight’s dauphin, dapple-dawn-drawn Falcon, in his riding
Of the rolling level underneath him steady air, and striding
High there, how he rung upon the rein of a wimpling wing
In his ecstasy! then off, off forth on swing, 5
As a skate’s heel sweeps smooth on a bow-bend: the hurl and gliding
Rebuffed the big wind. My heart in hiding
Stirred for a bird,—the achieve of; the mastery of the thing!

Brute beauty and valour and act, oh, air, pride, plume, here
Buckle! AND the fire that breaks from thee then, a billion 10
Times told lovelier, more dangerous, O my chevalier!

No wonder of it: shéer plód makes plough down sillion
Shine, and blue-bleak embers, ah my dear,
Fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermillion."- Gerard Manley Hopkins


When I first read Hopkins’ poem “The Windhover”, I was positive that the poem was merely about a Falcon’s fall from the sky; however, once I noticed Hopkins’ opening lines “To Christ our Lord”, a whole new hidden meaning seeped onto the page from the intricately planned stanzas. The journey of the hawk seems to personify the life and death of Jesus Christ and provides a glimpse at mankind’s relationship with Him. By contrasting the bird’s absolute power and majesty at the beginning of the poem with the of elimination of dignity and pride towards the end, Hopkins creates a parallel to Christ's sacrifice of His divinity to win man's salvation.

The stanza,

“Brute beauty and valour and act, oh, air, pride, plume, here
Buckle! AND the fire that breaks from thee then, a billion 10
Times told lovelier, more dangerous, O my chevalier!”

is truly the pivotal point in the poem.

Hopkins begins by establishing the grandeur of Christ, or in this case the Falcon, in the list of “ brute, beauty, valour”, and then portrays the sacrifice of these things by saying “and act, oh, air, pride, plume, here Buckle!” (Hopkins 9-10). “Buckle” contains a great connotation in that it represents the diminishing of Christ’s human spirit. The next line, “AND the fire that breaks from thee then, a billion 10
Times told lovelier, more dangerous, O my chevalier!”, portrays Christ as conqueror or “ chevalier” over death and depicts the arising of the incredible promise of eternal life through Him for the believer in “the fire that breaks from thee” (Hopkins 10-11).

The last stanza
No wonder of it: shéer plód makes plough down sillion
Shine, and blue-bleak embers, ah my dear, 13
Fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermillion.

discusses the promise of the cross and the struggles that are overcome through it. While some may find “no wonder” in the cross, its true message of the omnipotent and loving God “makes down sillion (the immense suffering of Christ) shine”. Even though “The blue-bleak embers (or the nonbelievers betray Christ and) fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermillion (the Blood of Christ), the glory of God shines through in Jesus’ Resurrection (Hopkins 12-14). Though this poem can be interpreted in many different ways, I find this interpretation to make perfect sense with Hopkins’ choice of prose and diction. Through his personification of the Hawk, I was able to discover new meaning in the persecution, Crucifixion and Resurrection of Christ.