A Poem for the Day: "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud" by William Wordsworth

Summer is coming to an end, and fall will be here before we know it.  Interestingly, over the past few days two of my friends ('Thanks!' Jan and Dixie) each reminded me of a poem written in 1804 by William Wordsworth (1770-1850) that has always been a favorite of mine, I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud (also known as Daffodils).  I love this poem!  It is a 'cup that simply and eloquently overflows with joy' every time I read it.  I thought that it might be nice to ease into the coming fall with a sublime memory of the summer we are leaving behind by posting the poem and sharing it with all of you.

I am also featuring a beautiful ceramic tile that was designed by Walter Crane (1845-1915).  Crane was an illustrator of books and loved graphic design, and was greatly influenced by the artists of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood.  Crane, an Englishman, very much embraced the "Arts and Crafts" movement that flourished in England between 1880 and about 1910; and, in fact, became the first president of the "Arts and Crafts Exhibition Society in 1887.  Crane developed this design for the tile (at upper right) that was then prepared as a glazed ceramic tile by the Pilkington Tile and Pottery Co. Earthenware, and is thought to be circa 1900.  If you are interested in the English Arts and Crafts movement, I thoroughly recommend A.S. Byatt's recent novel, The Children's Book (2009).  Somehow this tile just reminds me of Wordsworth's beautiful poem.  Can you imagine having the back-splash of your kitchen, or the surround of your fireplace made up of this beautiful motif? ['Click' on the image for a larger view of this beautiful tile]


I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud

I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine
and twinkle on the Milky Way,
They stretched in never-ending line
along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company:
I gazed--and gazed--but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:

For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.

(1804)

***

A Poem for the Day - "The Solitary Reaper" By William Wordsworth

Behold her, single in the field,
Yon solitary Highland Lass!
Reaping and singing by herself;
Stop here, or gently pass!
Alone she cuts and binds the grain,
And sings a melancholy strain;
O listen! for the Vale profound
Is overflowing with the sound.

No Nightingale did ever chaunt
More welcome notes to weary bands
Of travellers in some shady haunt,
Among Arabian sands:
A voice so thrilling ne'er was heard
In spring-time from the Cuckoo-bird,
Breaking the silence of the seas
Among the farthest Hebrides.

Will no one tell me what she sings?--
Perhaps the plaintive numbers flow
For old, unhappy, far-off things,
And battles long ago:
Or is it some more humble lay,
Familiar matter of to-day?
Some natural sorrow, loss, or pain,
That has been, and may be again?

Whate'er the theme, the Maiden sang
As if her song could have no ending;
I saw her singing at her work,
And o'er the sickle bending;--
I listened, motionless and still;
And, as I mounted up the hill,
The music in my heart I bore,
Long after it was heard no more.

William Wordsworth, 1805

***

I have always loved this beautiful and lyrical ballad by the English poet, William Wordsworth (1770-1850). Wordsworth composed this approximately two years after a summer ramble in the Scottish Highlands with his sister, Dorothy, and his friend, Samuel Taylor Coleridge.

Wordsworth's sister, Dorothy, recorded the event in her journal entry for September 13, 1803: "It was harvest time, and the fields were quietly -- might I be allowed to say pensively? -- enlivened by small companies of reapers. It is not uncommon in the more lonely parts of the Highlands to see a single person so employed."

Also, Wordsworth, in a note to an 1807 edition including the poem, acknowledged that "This Poem was suggested by a beautiful sentence in a MS Tour in Scotland written by a Friend, the last line being taken from it verbatim." Wordsworth’s friend, Thomas Wilkinson, wrote a book, Tours to the British Mountains; and in this travelogue he observed that he had "Passed a Female who was reaping alone: she sung in Erse as she bended over her sickle; the sweetest human voice I ever heard: her strains were tenderly melancholy, and felt delicious, long after they were heard no more."

The poem is written in iambic tetrameter, i.e., the rhyming scheme is "a-b-a-b-c-c-d-d." Although, this scheme breaks down in the "a" rhyme in the first and last stanzas.

I looked at my marginalia notes associated with this poem in my college Romantic Poets textbook (positively ancient now!). Apparently, Wordsworth created several ballads that are considered 'solitaries.' Where the subject of the poem is alone with no interaction with others. In fact, in this poem, the young Highland lass, the reaper, is considered by Wordsworth to be a 'poet' herself; even though Wordsworth doesn't know what she is saying. Is it because he is too far away, and can only hear her singing? Or, is it because he doesn't understand her 'language'? Wordsworth compares the young lass and her singing to that of the Nightingale and the Cuckoo. In other words, they are all 'solitary' singers in touch, or communing, with Nature. Anyway you cut it, this is a beautiful, beautiful poem; and well worth reading every once in a while.

Finally, thanks to my friend, Laurel, for her reminder of the beautiful painting entitled, "The Song of the Lark," by the 19th century French Realist painter, Jules Breton (1827-1906).