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 not now 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.