Hefting with Hopkins

Yesterday I was drawing my daughter from her crib, waking her from a nap. She still had her eyes closed and I was holding her as one would a newborn, crossways like a dozen wrapped roses.

Hopkins' words came to my mind; I didn't at all will them: everything wears the dearest freshness deep down things.

Later I wondered what those words had to do with the act of holding my daughter and looking at her still asleep. The words became a camera to take a picture of the event, but they also became interpreters of the event.

I think it has to do with my daughter's person. She is 18 months old and compact. Her body is like the bicep of a football player, like good cabinetry, oak solid. It is the entire human body in a very small space. But it's more than person, it is personhood. My daughter's purity is palpable, and it seems as if all that compact body is fully integrated with its spirit, hence the physical solidity of the body?

The dearest freshness, the spirit worn entirely with the body.