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.