Awe and wonder

A glorious sunset does it for me too, nanad; so does a perfect snowscape and a beautiful waterfall...

Any view that bathes the eyes and stirs those level feelings of awe and wonder, like my grandchildren's delight in the world around them, a late summer day of long shadows and a golden glow over everything, seeing loved ones happy, walking into a beautiful building containing works of art, sculptures by Henry Moore, a mother and tiger cubs playing in the wild, dolphins leaping though the ocean, whales surfacing and splashing their tails, long skeins of ducks flying overhead, African villages celebrating the instalation of their water supply, children surviving and overcoming any threat to their safety........... too many to list

A racehorse running at full speed, or a horse like the late, great Desert Orchid jumping a fence; in the words of his connections 'point him at a fence and it's as if an explosion has gone off in his head'. Or my whippet running along an empty beach first thing in the morning. And any bird of prey flying.

I glory in many things on this Earth. There is much to astound and impress and awe us. And then there is the universe around us. Awesome, wonderful and glorious.

A newborn baby

Electric lightning storms with glorious thunder "God moving his furniture" my granddad used to say. On a mountain hike some years ago we heard a rumbling (we were walking on a road at that stage) and we were standing on a bridge trying to work out what was making the noise when we realised it was a 'flash flood' coming thundering down the river. Awesome. On another occasion I was lucky enough to see a waterspout arise from the ocean. I thought the end of the world had come, didn't know what it was.

A spiders web when the dew has frosted into crystals.

Just all life really - everything on this earth is wonderful. It is all entitled to be here and live life to the full, which is why I get so mad when I see us trying so hard to ruin the planet, and destroy as we see fit.

Wet cats!

Sorry got my threads tangled

Mountains and lakes, with the moon on the water. Or Star Lake in Minnesota, with the loons calling. And yes, jess a newborn baby.

My Alpine scenery, Scheherazade, waterfalls.

Yes! Wild sounds of loons calling, and the cry of buzzards, waves and wind, the sun and moon, and all of this natural world, and all that is good in it.

When my father, an old soldier, was buried a lone bugler played the past post. That was haunting and very poignant.

Goldcrest zipping about among the branches of a silver birch.

It's AWESOME when a barn owl perches on a post of your garden fence, and looks at you while you look at it from about ten metres away.

Was sitting in a barn one day waiting for a farrier to shoe my pony; as I sat on a hay bale reading a book I felt two eyes piercing into me..the old fox was sat on a wall watching me. We eyeballed each other for a split second and then he was away and my pony was stood there instead. I've never forgot that moment and it was a long, long time ago. It's like two worlds meeting out and reaching each other.

I may be an atheist, but I'm with Gerard Manly Hopkins on this one – Glory be to God for dappled things…

And I'm with him on "Long live the weeds and the wilderness yet."

I'd never heard of him before now, but I love the quote you've posted, B

I love GMH's use of words, although I do not know his poetry well. Where does your quote come from Bags?
I went to my allotment yesterday (which is my 'sanctuary' as i live in the city). It has been a bit neglected this summer [due to 'Walking a Marathon (in a day) training!] and Bags' Hopkins' quote describes it perfectly! [Restoring it will be my 'project' for 2013]

My place of awe and wonder this week was a visit to Coventry Cathedral with an American friend.

I love medieval cathedrals so was not that keen. But reading Coventry's story after the bombing of Nov 1940--then the whole ethos of keeping the shell (with the words 'Father Forgive' which had been inscribed within days of the bombing) while building the new--with the greatest talent of the 20th C--really impressed me on many levels.

Seeing John Piper's baptistry window--with the sunlight illuminating the modern stained glass panels, left me speechless with awe and wonder.

Hello, miney. The GMH quote is the last line of the poem Inversnaid which you can get to by clicking on the blue link . It's a beautiful poem.

Just now the sun is hitting the Lomond Hills. The colours of the masses of trees at the bottom of the fields near to us, is as if they are shot with not only the yellows and oranges of Autumn, but blues/greys/greens as well. A sight to behold! And on top of our golden oak tree, a magpie is gawping down at DH as he sweeps up leaves (leaving a pile of them in the corner near the old wall for any possible hibernating creatures, of course)!

For me it is the view from our balcony on an autumn morning when the mist gathers along the course of the river at the bottom of the valley and creates the impression that the hills are floating in the sea.