Lines 31-50 Summary

Lines 31-50

—Old Gandolf with his paltry onion-stone,
Put me where I may look at him! True peach,
Rosy and flawless: how I earned the prize!
Draw close: that conflagration of my church
—What then? So much was saved if aught were missed!
My sons, ye would not be my death? Go dig
The white-grape vineyard where the oil-press stood,
Drop water gently till the surface sink,
And if ye find… Ah God, I know not, I!…
Bedded in store of rotten fig-leaves soft,
And corded up in a tight olive-frail,
Some lump, ah God, of lapis lazuli,
Big as a Jew's head cut off at the nape,
Blue as a vein o'er the Madonna's breast
Sons, all have I bequeathed you, villas, all,
That brave Frascati villa with its bath,
So, let the blue lump poise between my knees,
Like God the Father's globe on both his hands
Ye worship in the Jesu Church so gay,
For Gandolf shall not choose but see and burst!

• Our speaker, the bishop, wants to be laid to rest in a place where he has a good view of Gandolf's measly ("paltry") tomb ("onion stone" is a kind of marble). By contrast, he reminds us that his own tomb will have that rare, flawless peach marble. What's more: the bishop reminds us that he earned this luxury.
• Hmm—is anyone starting to think that this guy is sounding less like a bishop and more like a materialistic egomaniac? Check out "Speaker" for more on him.
• The bishop then lapses into some confusing ramblings. Remember that the guy is on his deathbed, after all, so we can forgive him if he's not totally coherent the whole time.
• He mentions some destruction ("conflagration") of his church, but it's not clear if he's imagining this or remembering it. Apparently it means a lot if anything was spared from this destruction ("So much was saved if aught [anything] were missed!") (35).
• Then he addresses his sons. Do they want to kill him ("ye would not be my death?" (36))? No? Then he's got a mission for them—no pressure or anything, guys.
• Their mission—should they choose to accept it—is to go digging in a vineyard and find an oil press. Then they'll find…well, the bishop forgets what he's talking about for a second there.
• Wait, now he remembers. It's a lump of lapis lazuli, all wrapped up and "Big as a Jew's head cut off at the nape/ Blue as a vein o'er the Madonna's breast " (42-43). And he's talking about the mother of Jesus here, not the pop star.
• Well, that's a perfectly disturbing pair of similes. We're starting to get more and more skeeved out by this bishop.
• Geology note: lapis lazuli is a bright blue ornamental stone.
• The bishop goes on to promise his sons villas, including one in the Italian resort town of Frascati, if they put that big blue stone between his knees when he's entombed.
• It looks like he wants this stone to decorate his tomb, so he's not asking to be buried with it. Instead, he wants his likeness on the tomb to display it, just like God is shown to be touching the globe of the earth.
• Woah—comparing yourself to God? This bishop may be taking things a step too far with this simile, but he really wants to rub it in Gandolf's face, to make him "burst" with envy. What a nice fella this bishop's turning out to be.