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| attributed to Baccio Baldini Libyan Sibyl ca. 1470-80 engraving British Museum |
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| Girolamo di Benvenuto Libyan Sibyl before 1524 drawing British Museum |
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| Raffaello Schiaminossi Libyan Sibyl 1609 etching British Museum |
SPELT FROM SIBYL'S LEAVES
Earnest, earthless, equal, attuneable, faulty, voluminous . . . stupendous
Evening strains to be time's vast, womb-of-all, home-of-all, hearse-of-all night.
Her fond yellow hornlight wound to the west, her wild hollow hoarlight hung to the height
Waste; her earliest stars, earlstars, stars principal, overbend us,
Fire-featuring heaven. For earth her being has unbound; her dapple is at an end, as-
tray or aswarm, all throughther, in throngs; self in self steeped and pashed––quite
Disremembering, dismembering all now. Heart, you round me right
With: Our evening is over us; our night whelms, whelms, and will end us.
Only the beakleaved boughs dragonish damask the tool-smooth bleak light; black,
Ever so black on it. Our tale, O our oracle! Let life, waned, ah let life wind
Off her once skeined stained veined variety upon, all on two spools; part, pen, pack
Now her all in two flocks, two folds––black, white; right, wrong; reckon but, reck but, mind
But these two; ware of a world where but these two tell, each off the other; of a rack
Where, selfwrung, selfstrung, sheathe- and shelterless, thoughts against thoughts in groans grind.
– Gerard Manley Hopkins
Hopkins called this poem "the longest sonnet ever made." In sprung rhythm, eight stresses to the line. Composed in 1884-85 – title and theme from the Latin hymn Dies irae: 'As David and the Sibyl testify . . . what terror shall affright the soul when the Judge comes . . .'
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| attributed to Baccio Baldini Delphic Sibyl ca. 1470-80 engraving British Museum |
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| Girolamo di Benvenuto Delphic Sibyl before 1524 drawing British Museum |
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| Raffaello Schiaminossi Delphic Sibyl 1609 etching British Museum |
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| attributed to Baccio Baldini Persian Sibyl ca. 1470-80 engraving British Museum |
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| Girolamo di Benvenuto Persian Sibyl before 1524 drawing British Museum |
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| Raffaello Schiaminossi Persian Sibyl 1609 etching British Museum |
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| attributed to Baccio Baldini Erythraean Sibyl ca. 1470-80 engraving British, Museum |
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| Girolamo di Benvenuto Erythraean Sibyl before 1524 drawing British Museum |
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| Raffaello Schiaminossi Erythraean Sibyl 1609 etching British Museum |
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| attributed to Baccio Baldini Samian Sibyl ca. 1470-80 engraving British Museum |
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| Girolamo di Benvenuto Samian Sibyl before 1524 drawing British Museum |
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| Raffaello Schiaminossi Samian Sibyl 1609 etching British Museum |