WRFH/Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM - The Poetry Fix: As Kingfishers Catch Fire

Episode Date: September 26, 2025

Today, Erika Kyba reads "As Kingfishers Catch Fire," by Gerard Manley Hopkins. In this poem, Hopkins explores the natural image of kingfishers and dragonflies reflecting the sun's light, and he uses it to portray how God's glory shines forth in every single person, with all their particularities.

Welcome to the Poetry Fix on Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM. I'm your host, Erica Kaiba, bringing you your weekly fix of poetry from across time. Today we're reading as King Fischer's Catch Fire by Gerard Manley Hopkins. Very true to form, Hopkins begins this poem by delivering a vivid description of the natural world, which unfolds into a spiritual meditation. We start with the image of a kingfisher, a small bird with bright blue plumage on its crest wings. Its chest, however, is a brilliant orange. When Hopkins writes of the kingfisher catching fire, you can almost imagine the bird flying against a sunset sky, with this plumage radiating the

light as if the bird is incandescent. Keep imagining this background of a sunset, or sunrise, if you like, as Hopkins completes the line. As kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame. One can picture the dragonfly with its iridescent wings, also seeming to ignite as it reflects the sun's light. Now, there's a literal, natural access to this scene. Hopkins is trying to capture a real kingfisher and a real dragonfly, but there's also a spiritual significance to it. The reason that the bird and the dragonfly are so radiant is that they are drawing from a far more dazzling power than themselves, that of the sun. As they capture and reflect the sun's light, not only is their own beauty, enhanced, but the son's glory is expressed in a new and unique way through them.

Now, let's see how this image gains meaning in light of the sonnet's conclusion. In the Cestet, Hopkins writes that Christ plays in 10,000 places, lovely in limbs and lovely in eyes not his, to the father through the features of men's faces. The overarching idea that Hopkins has been working up to is that every person, in all the particularity of his or her being reflects God. Simply by existing, they reflect Christ as the Kingfisher reflects the sun. There's a little more to it than that, of course. Hopkins doesn't view existence as passive, but as something very active. He writes that the just man justices, in other words, being is doing. And when mortal creatures act in accord with what they were made to be,

when the dragonfly is dragon flying and the just man is justicing and Hopkins is Hopkinsing, God's glory shines through. With all that said, let's dive in. As Kingfisher's Catch Fire by Gerard Manley Hopkins. As kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies draw a flame. As tumbled over rim and roundy wells, stones ring. Like each tucked string tells, each hung man. bells both swung, finds tongue to fling out broad its name. Each mortal thing does one thing and the same.

Deals out that being indoors, each one dwells. Selves, goes itself. Myself, it speaks and spells. Crying, what I do is me. For that I came. I say more. The just man, justices, keeps grace. That keeps all his going's graces. acts in God's eye what in God's eye he is. Christ. For Christ plays in 10,000 places. Lovely in limbs. And lovely in eyes not his. To the father through the features of men's faces.

You've been listening to The Poetry Fix with Erica Kaiba. If you enjoyed this episode, consider following the Poetry Fix on Spotify, YouTube, or Apple Podcasts. And if you have any poems you want to be able to be able to do. want to see in a future episode, email your suggestions to the poetry fix at gmail.com. Join me next week and we'll be reading Emily Dickinson's safe in their alabaster chambers.