Spring and Fall

Spring and Fall 

To a young child

By Gerard Manley Hopkins

Márgarét, áre you gríeving

Over Goldengrove unleaving?

Leáves like the things of man, you

With your fresh thoughts care for, can you?

Ah! ás the heart grows older

It will come to such sights colder

By and by, nor spare a sigh

Though worlds of wanwood leafmeal lie;

And yet you wíll weep and know why.

Now no matter, child, the name:

Sórrow’s spríngs áre the same.

Nor mouth had, no nor mind, expressed

What heart heard of, ghost guessed:

It ís the blight man was born for,

It is Margaret you mourn for.

 

Gerard Manley Hopkins

He was born on 28^th July 1844.  He was the eldest of the nine children. He was a Jesuit priest and an English poet.  Hopkins wanted to be a painter, he was inspired by the works of John Ruskin and the Pre Raphaelites. But his siblings were much into language, religion and creative arts.  Hopkins migrated with his family to Hampstead in 1852 near to John Keats. He was influenced to lead a melancholic life and was not interested to make progress in his poetic life.  Heavy work load made him to dislike Dublin.  He became sick and his vision became so weak.  He refused to publish his works. But soon he understood that a true poet needs all types of criticism and motivation.  He was confused between his religious duties and his poetic interest.  He died in 1889 after a serious ill health and typhoid fever at the age of 44.   His last words on his death bed were “I am so happy, I am so happy. I loved my life.

 

Summary

The poem starts with a question to a child named Margret who is grieving over the Goldengrove the place which is losing its leaves due to the arrival of winter. The small child broods with sadness over the leafless grove as much as the things of human.  The poet reflects the thoughts of the child.  The thoughts go around the reality of death in life.  It is an important part of life.  the concern of mortality could not be avoided in human life.

 

Detail analysis

Lines 1 to 4

Márgarét, áre you gríeving

Over Goldengrove unleaving?

Leáves like the things of man, you

With your fresh thoughts care for, can you?

 

The poet starts the poem with a question to his character called Margaret as she is grieving over the Golden grove where the leaves are falling due to the autumn season. They are waiting to welcome the winter.  Her sadness may be due to losing the leaves, she as a small child could not recognize the reality of nature, and she feels sad to see the golden grove losing it prettiness.  Her fresh thoughts are contemplating over the falling of leaves which indicate their end.  The speaker says that she would not cry over the natural process of nature after she is matured enough to understand the nature. The humans are too like leaves, they are don’t prefer to see themselves getting old and to cross all the stages of life including death. 

 

Lines 5 – 9

 

Ah! ás the heart grows older

It will come to such sights colder

By and by, nor spare a sigh

Though worlds of wanwood leafmeal lie;

And yet you wíll weep and know why.

 

The transition takes place in these lines.  The speaker brings out the transformation of thoughts.

Her heart will mature and she will grow older and looks the changes around her with no reactions. She will be cold towards the sight of the nature’s changes.  There will be no grief or sigh from her as she would not mourn to see the demise of the nature due to seasonal changes. The poet expresses that when Margaret is old enough, she will see and accept the reality of life which is completed with death and decay and she weeps as she knows that she too has to face the same decay and death.  There is a great transformation in thoughts of a child to an adult.

 

 

Lines 10-11

 

“Now no matter, child, the name:

Sórrow’s spríngs áre the same.”

 

Now no matter Margret would mourn still after her adulthood, as her transformation gives her more clarity and understanding about life.  Everything is same, as a child Margret grieves over the shedding of the tree leaves as the life of the tree ends, but the same Margret would be sad to accept the reality of decay and death of human life including herself. Sorrow never ends.  All would be same except the season, age and years.

 

 Lines 12-15

 

“Nor mouth had, no nor mind, expressed

What heart heard of, ghost guessed:

It ís the blight man was born for,

It is Margaret you mourn for.”

 

The last few lines concludes the thoughts of the speaker.  The reason for Margret’s sadness has nothing to do with the natural process of the trees due to the seasonal changes. As  a child she mourns for the decaying leaves of a tree, but one day as an adult she would mourn for her decay and death.  When time goes by she would learns the truth of life cycle of humans.

 

Literary devices

The title spring and fall gives an idea of two seasons of the nature.  Season of falling of leaves and the spring of fruits.  Various devices are used in the poem to bring about the thoughts of the poet with the deepest meaning.  The speaker uses 2^nd person - the father feeling for his daughter who is grieving over the shedding of the leaves of the trees.

Metaphor – “fresh thoughts” innocence of a child whose thoughts are fresh with no experience of the world. 

“Words of wanwood leafmeal lie” large collection of dead leaves.  Life is like the decaying leaves. The moving of time makes no one to notice the natural process.

“Sorrows spring” decay and death has its own flow which is the universal message from the speaker to the readers.

 

It is the blight man was born for- blight man means the human who has been doomed with death and decay.

 

Alliteration –

By and by, nor spare a sigh the sounds of /b/ and /s/ increase the meaning of the thoughts of the speaker.

And yet you wíll weep and know why.  /w/ give the effect.

 

What heart heard of, ghost guessed:  the appearance of /h/ and /g/ are another good examples.

 

Imagery

Goldengrove   dried leaves of autumn and a pretty place for children to enjoy.

“wanwood leafmeal”  heap of dried leaves to show the death and decay.

 

Simile

 

Leáves like the things of man, you” -  compares to the death which is unavoidable of human life cycle.

 

Personification

 

“Ah! ás the heart grows older” the maturity which is the natural process is mentioned here.  The girl would transform in her thoughts as she mature.

 

Form

 

The form is lyrical with a rhythm of stressed and unstressed syllables.  The rhyming pattern is AABBCC.  The tone of the poem is conversational - a father to his daughter which leads to the philosophical ideas.  The theme of the poem is the childhood innocence and life cycle of human beings that is the death and decay of life.

 

Thus the poem gives a universal message regarding the life and death of human cycle.  It is inevitable. The life from spring to fall which is under the control of nature.  The reality of life and death is well expressed by the poet.