Just like a skylark trapped in a cage, the poem suggests that man's spirit is trapped in one's body and suffers during life. However, both the skylark and human spirit sometimes sing happily but also try to escape their confinement and droop in sadness. Ultimately, a human's spirit belongs in a body, and will find freedom when reunited with a perfected, glorified body after death.

1. “THE CAGED SKYLARK”
BY GERALD MANLEY HOPKINS
Presentation by Emma Luengo

2. STANZA 1
As a dare-gale skylark scanted in a dull cage,
Man's mounting spirit in his bone-house, mean house, dwells —
That bird beyond the remembering his free fells;
This in drudgery, day-labouring-out life's age.
Summary
 Just like a skylark trapped in a cage, man’s spirit is
trapped in one’s body in the suffering that
encompasses life.

3. ANALYSIS OF STANZA 1
Rhyme scheme: ABBA
Juxtaposition
 skylark compared with a human’s spirit
 Cage compared with a body of a human
Sounds
 Dragging “d” sounds
 “dull” (ll. 1), “dwells” (ll. 2), “drudgery” (ll. 4), and
“day” (ll. 4)
 Other long sounds
 “bone” (ll. 2), “house” (ll. 2), “free fells” (ll. 3), and
“labouring” (ll. 3)
o Long sounds and multiple clauses in one sentence
reflect how long life is for a spirit.

4. STANZA 2
Though aloft on turf or perch or poor low stage
Both sing sometímes the sweetest, sweetest spells,
Yet both droop deadly sómetimes in their cells
Or wring their barriers in bursts of fear or rage.
Summary
 Both the birds and the human soul sometimes
sing happily, sorrowfully, and other times try to
escape from their cage at times, regardless of
where they are.

5. ANALYSIS OF 2ND STANZA
Rhyme scheme: CBBC
 The interlocking stanzas furthers the juxtaposition
between the skylark and the human
Metaphor
 “turf or perch or low stage” (ll. 5)
 Indicates different stages of life

6. ANALYSIS OF 2ND STANZA
Sounds
 Soft “s” sounds indicate positive times during life
 “sweetest, sweetest spells” (ll. 6)
 Long “d” sounds indicate sad times during life
 “droop deadly” (ll. 7)
o Sharp “b” sounds indicate times discontentment or
anger during life
o “barriers in bursts” (ll. 8)

7. SHIFT FROM 2ND TO 3RD STANZA
 The poem shifts from quatrains to tercets.
 Similarly, the juxtaposition becomes a metaphor
 The skylark symbolizes the human’s spirit.
 The cage symbolizes the human’s body.

8. STANZA 3
Not that the sweet-fowl, song-fowl, needs no rest —
Why, hear him, hear him babble & drop down to his nest,
But his own nest, wild nest, no prison.
Summary
 A human’s spirit does not ultimately have unlimited
freedom as the spirit needs a home within a
idealistic form of the body.

9. 3RD STANZA ANALYSIS
Sounds
 “hear him, babble and drop down to his nest”
(ll. 10).
 The negative “b” sound in “babble” and “d” sound in
“drop down” indicates that the bird too much freedom is
harmful for the bird.
 The positive “s” sounds in “nest” show that the nest is
the true home of the soul.
Metaphor
 Nest is symbolically the body.
 Though a body can be constricting at times, it is
where the soul belongs.

10. STANZA 4
Man's spirit will be flesh-bound, when found at best,
But uncumberèd: meadow-down is not distressed
For a rainbow footing it nor he for his bónes rísen.
Summary
 A human’s spirit can be expressed best within a
perfected, glorified body, which can only be
achieved after death.

11. ANALYSIS OF 4TH STANZA
Rhyme scheme: DFG
Symbolism
o “Bones risen” (ll. 13) describe the death of the
flawed mortal body.
o “Rainbow” (ll. 13) decribes heaven.

12. ANALYSIS OF 4TH STANZA
Sound
o There are many positive soft “s” sounds that
describe the body
o “flesh” (ll. 12), “best” (12), “not distressed”
(13).
o Illustrates that this reuniting of the spirit and
the body is ideal.

13. EVALUATION OF POEM
 “A poem begins in delight, it inclines to the impulse,
it assumes direction with the first line laid down, it
runs a course of lucky events, and ends in a
clarification of life-not necessarily a great
clarification, such as sects and cults are founded
on, but in a momentary stay against confusion.”
-Robert Frost

14. IT IS A GREAT POEM
“As a dare-gale skylark scanted in a dull cage,” (ll.1)
 First line immediately draws a reader’s attention
and provides context of the poem.
 It illustrates one of the important themes of the
poem, freedom vs. confinement.

15. IT IS A GREAT POEM
Middle of the poem
 The middle of the poem does “run a course of lucky
events,” because it effectively contrasts the flawed
mortal body with the ideal eternal body by using
sound and diction.
End of the poem
 Clarfication of life-
 The end of the poem expresses the idea that a human’s
spirit will ultimately reunite with a perfect version of the
human body.