Gerard Manley Hopkins Burns His Early Poems
He offers them, page by page,
to pincers of flame.
Purple, Keatsian verse
penned at Highgate School.
Christ-centred sonnets
from his Balliol years.
He's parting with them gladly,
resolved to write no more
as he starts his novitiate,
takes first steps
along the narrow Ignatian way
of self-discipline; self-sacrifice.
Stanzas melt, relinquish
rhyme and metre.
Soon – as when Summer of his –
Others end where they began.
Elected Silence, sing to me
And beat upon my whorléd ear.
He sits forward on the hearthrug,
watches old words dissolve
into kindling and coal.
Pinheads of paper
are floating; darting – smudge
the wax-glow of his cheeks.
Ashes have flecked the grate,
drifted under its bars.
soft sift hourglass
New words are sounding,
searching for form and cadence.
He rakes the fire's embers.
Sheila Jacob lives in North Wales with her husband. She was born and raised in Birmingham and resumed writing poetry in 2013 after a long absence. She is frequently inspired by her working class ‘50s childhood. Her poems have been published in a number of UK magazines and webzines. She has also self-published a small collection of poems dedicated to her Dad, who died when she was fourteen.