Compare and contrast the structure and poetic elements of Elizabeth Barrett Browning's "Sonnet 43" and Gerard Manley Hopkins' "God's Grandeur."

Both poems--“Sonnet 43” and “God’s Grandeur” are love poems. “Sonnet 43” is a love poem toward the narrator’s lover, and “God’s Grandeur,” written when Hopkins was a priest, is a poem showing the narrator’s love for God and his creations. Both poems have standard sonnet rhyme schemes of: abba/cdcdcd

In addition, the authors of both have used repetition for effect. Browning to show the narrators devotion and Hopkins to help illustrate the casual disregard the common man has for God’s creation. Alliteration and internal rhyme have been used to heighten the sound effect of the poems as they are read.

“Sonnet 43” is an optimistic and simple homage to a lover, but it is deep in its intensity. "God's Grandeur" is a little bleaker as it addresses the way in which man is destroying the world because he does not appreciate the grandeur that surrounds him. However, the final part of the sonnet is more optimistic as Hopkins’s believes the magnificence and power of God will overcome.