On the 13th of March 1879 Gerard Manley Hopkins, a curate at St Aloysius’ church in oxford at the time took an afternoon stroll in the country side, a place he had been cherishing since he started studying in oxford many years before. He had found that all the bountiful poplars lining the side of the river near Binsey had been cut down. Oxfords countryside had always been very close to Hopkins heart, leaving him distressed at the thought that the effervescent beauty of the countryside had been destroyed; Thus spurring the composition of the well-known poem ‘Binsey Poplars”.
The poem is composed in “sprung rhythm,” the pioneering metric form created by Hopkins himself. “In sprung rhythm the number of accents in a line is counted, but the number of syllables is not.” (enotes.com). As a result Hopkins uses this to group accented syllables together to create striking onomatopoeic effects. For example, the third line features a substantial recurrence of the accented words, “all” and “felled that catch the ear like the shocks of a hatchet on the tree trunks.
This poem holds two irregular stanzas of eight and 16 lines which grieve the loss of nature to the woodsman’s axe. The first stanza is written with the eye of the author, intimate descriptions of the trees that were once by the bank of the river are depicted.
The theme of Tragedy and loss are prominent themes throughout the poem. ‘O if we knew what we do”. Hopkins mourns the wholesale damage of the natural world. Just when the poplars are gone, so are the joyful times Hopkins spent at Oxford, days when he immersed himself in the beauty of the “sweet especial rural scene”
The tone of the poem is mournful and melancholic. Hopkins highlights the way that the poplars affected the nature around them. The aspens alter the quality of the sun and add to the decorative natural configuration along the side of the river. Cutting down the trees also destroys the order of the whole countryside. He also uses many metaphors and examples such as the military image in the first verse that suggests that the industrial advances in the countryside are almost a form of warfare. In verse two the pricked eyeball is an upsetting an painful image, which Hopkins’ used intentionally to stress his severe agony and sorrow over the cut down poplars.
Literary devices where used broadly by Hopkins throughout this poem. Interior rhymes, alliteration and end-rhyme bind the poem together. In fact Hopkins used more alliteration than any other poet of his time. As seen in phrases “fresh and following folded rank”, “dandled a sandalled shadow.” And “all felled are felled”.
Many connotations are used throughout the poem with deeper meanings implied. A simple poem on the outside holds great complexity. For example “sleek and seeing ball” a note that vision can be made useless with just one prick.

Hopkins wrote this poem to open up the eyes of the people who deliberately destroyed Hopkins’ favourite place. He expresses amplified rage at the people who felled the once beautiful part of the countryside.
“Binsey Poplars” grieves the loss of the “sweet especial rural scene” that was present before the felling of the trees, the poem itself refurbishes the image of the trees to the mind's eye. The ‘rural scene’ destroyed by the ignorance of humanity is reproduced by the art of the poet.

Bibliography:

http://www.sparknotes.com/poetry/hopkins/section6.rhtml http://year12resourcessite.wikispaces.com/file/view/Binsey_Poplars_428946.pdf https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8hjfkcVJo34 http://www.crossref-it.info/textguide/The-poetry-of-Gerard-Manley-Hopkins/6/596 http://impracticalcriticism.wordpress.com/2011/09/24/gerald-manley-hopkins-binsey-poplars-2/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hKj_oYiAMYQ