Nondum

Gerard Manley Hopkins

 

“Verily Thou art a God that hidest Thyself.” —Isaiah 45:15

 

God, though to Thee our psalm we raise

No answering voice comes from the skies;

To Thee the trembling sinner prays

But no forgiving voice replies;

Our prayer seems lost in desert ways,

Our hymn in the vast silence dies.

 

We see the glories of the earth

But not the hand that wrought them all:

Night to a myriad worlds gives birth,

Yet like a lighted empty hall

Where stands no host at door or hearth

Vacant creation’s lamps appall.

 

We guess; we clothe Thee, unseen King,

With attributes we deem are meet;

Each in his own imagining

Sets up a shadow in Thy seat;

Yet know not how our gifts to bring,

Where seek Thee with unsandalled feet.

 

And still th’unbroken silence broods

While ages and while æons runs,

As erst upon chaotic floods

The Spirit hovered ere the sun

Had called the seasons’ changeful moods

And life’s first germs from death had won.

 

And still th’abysses infinite

Surround the peak from which we gaze.

Deep calls to deep, and blackest night

Giddies the soul with blinding daze

That dares to cast its searching sight

On being’s dread and vacant maze.

 

And Thou art silent, whilst Thy world

Contends about its many creeds

And hosts confront with flags unfurled

And zeal is flushed and pity bleeds

And truth is heard, with tears impearled,

A moaning voice among the reeds.

 

My hand upon my lips I lay;

The breast’s desponding sob I quell;

I move along life’ tomb-decked way

And listen to the passing bell

Summoning men from speechless day

To death’s more silent, darker spell.

 

Oh! till Thou givest that sense beyond,

To shew Thee that Thou art, and near,

Let patience with her chastening wand

And lead me child-like by the hand

If still in darkness not in fear.

 

Speak! whisper to my watching heart

One word-as when a mother speaks

Soft, when she sees her infant start,

Till dimpled joy steals o’er its cheeks.

Then, to behold Thee as Thou art,

I’ll wait till morn eternal breaks.

 

“Nondum” is Latin for “not yet.” Hopkins’ moving poem echoes the Psalmist who cries, “How long, LORD? wilt thou hide thyself for ever?” (Psalm 89). In a time of spiritual darkness, Hopkins fails to find any comfort in prayer or in nature. He pleads for a single whisper from God’s “still, small voice” (1 Kings 19), to strengthen him until the time he can know God “even as I am known (1 Cor. 13).