Poetry Readers

Brigadier

Brigadier · Nov 5, 2017

And this poem brings us into Week 3,
how quickly time has passed us by.
But you don't want to hear from little ole me,
so here's a lovely poem, as I try not to lie.

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.

I wrote an essay based on this poem and exploring the naturalist perspective of it all, so our questions will be linked into that.

1. Overall, did you like the poem, feel neutral on it, or feel complete dislike?
1a. Was there any part that you particularly like or disliked, or stuck out to you in some meaningful way?
2. What did each stanza accomplish for you?
3. What do you think the meaning of the poem was?
4. Did the naturalist element and the relationship with nature stick out to you?
4a. How did his word choice show his relationship with nature?
5. How are you feeling about that rhyme scheme?

Those should be enough to get us started and as usual, skip over however many of them that you like.

And this poem brings us into Week 3, 
how quickly time has passed us by. 
But you don't want to hear from little ole me,
so here's a lovely poem, as I try not to lie.
 
[quote]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. [/quote]

I wrote an essay based on this poem and exploring the naturalist perspective of it all, so our questions will be linked into that.

1. Overall, did you like the poem, feel neutral on it, or feel complete dislike?
1a. Was there any part that you particularly like or disliked, or stuck out to you in some meaningful way?
2. What did each stanza accomplish for you?
3. What do you think the meaning of the poem was?
4. Did the naturalist element and the relationship with nature stick out to you?
4a. How did his word choice show his relationship with nature?
5. How are you feeling about that rhyme scheme?

Those should be enough to get us started and as usual, skip over however many of them that you like.

Aley Creator

Aley · Nov 9, 2017

Overall this feels like a schoolhouse poet. We have the rhyming, the close relationship with pretty language relating to neutral topic, how pretty nature is, and we handle it in a way much less personal than a confessional poet.

I feel like this is what the poets like emerson came back against because they worked more in the personal, and this feels like it gives us very little info about the actual poet's experience even though it is beautiful.

This story feels like it is one of a fairy tale as we go from lonely to being friends with the daffodils.
The relationship to the stars and sky feels like we could read more into it though.

BluesClues Officer

BluesClues · Nov 9, 2017

Okay, so I read this when it was first posted and then promptly forgot about it. And then I had this whole big thing written up with all my thoughts, but I cut it all out because my thoughts on this poem basically boil down to this.

If Wordsworth lived today, instead of writing poetry about the glory of nature he'd be one of those dudebros who shares a picture of a forest labeled "this is an antidepressant" with a picture of pills underneath that says "this is s***."

~~p.s. Lizz I didn't even realize your introduction to this poem was a poem 10/10~~

Aley Creator

Aley · Nov 9, 2017

Pft, omg I can so see that Blue XD

Brigadier

Brigadier · Nov 9, 2017

There's a reason they choose this poem for English curriculums, the baseline is pretty easy to read into and then you can take it as far as you want. So for me, I sometimes get distracted by the jokes about what these guys must have been smoking, while writing this stuff.

If you read in just a little bit, it's a poetic junkie talking about daffodils and loosing applying some questioning to it. Contentment is probably the word that I'm looking for here, the narrator finds that moment of almost absolute peace, but not quite all the way there.

And this is kind of a poet I like because I've written about this poem every year for many years, but I also have some resentment. There must be some other poem that we can study but nope, no one in any of my classes can tell anything about poetry,

So overall.
The simplicity is great but then it isn't.
The rhyme is just okay and by the end is still okay.

alliyah Admin

alliyah · Nov 9, 2017

Totally agree with that feeling of contentment Lizz - it seems to radiate from the poem. It reminds me of Bob Ross painting happy little trees except this poem is about happy little clouds. I wonder if there's some deeper layer we're not uncovering or if the point is literally just - awwh nature, so nice, so content in my mind. The last stanzas a bit confusing for me, is the narrator imagining this scene in their mind or are they writing about it, or actually seeing it?

There's also a one-ness with nature in the last two lines. Not only is nature beautiful, but in appreciating nature our hearts and very being can "dance with the daffodils" and be part of nature as well.

Aley Creator

Aley · Nov 9, 2017

I feel like if we wanted to look at this deeper we very well could. Read the first line again.

"I wandered lonely as a cloud" this could mean that he was a drifter, but i read into it as he was someone who is instable and easily emptied, and "lonely" so this speaker is a character who has issues being real. He is there and he is not. Clouds are not clouds because they are stable and remain, they are ever changing loose connections of water molicules we can see only because they have reached their max altitude and can go no further. They condense and dissipate as quickly as the wind blows them around.

He was as lonely as this momentary thing,
Until he came across something stable but unlike himself. He doesnt belong with the daffodils, they accept him, they host him.

And these hosts are welcoming. They accept everyone and everything, but the lakes and trees, the stable nature, has no mention of accepting him to the collection, just this daffodil host.

The thing is, while these more perminant hosts dont accept him, this teemporary summer host which does is the best despite being fleeting and not as expansive as a whole field.

The territories of this flower is on the rim of a bay, not a field, so we get a very real picture.

In a way this is a sad poem about toeing the line. You arent accepted in stable places as the speaker, just where the flowers are, and while that is the best place to be, it is also hard to balance there.

It is also talking about writers block if you identify the they in the last stanza as thoughts.

I feel like if we wanted to look at this deeper we very well could. Read the first line again.

"I wandered lonely as a cloud" this could mean that he was a drifter, but i read into it as he was someone who is instable and easily emptied, and "lonely" so this speaker is a character who has issues being real. He is there and he is not. Clouds are not clouds because they are stable and remain, they are ever changing loose connections of water molicules we can see only because they have reached their max altitude and can go no further. They condense and dissipate as quickly as the wind blows them around.

He was as lonely as this momentary thing,
Until he came across something stable but unlike himself. He doesnt belong with the daffodils, they accept him, they host him.

And these hosts are welcoming. They accept everyone and everything, but the lakes and trees, the stable nature, has no mention of accepting him to the collection, just this daffodil host.

The thing is, while these more perminant hosts dont accept him, this teemporary summer host which does is the best despite being fleeting and not as expansive as a whole field.

The territories of this flower is on the rim of a bay, not a field, so we get a very real picture.

In a way this is a sad poem about toeing the line. You arent accepted in stable places as the speaker, just where the flowers are, and while that is the best place to be, it is also hard to balance there.

It is also talking about writers block if you identify the they in the last stanza as thoughts.

alliyah Admin

alliyah · Nov 9, 2017

Hmm -- I think if we took the loneliness as literally being lonely - this poem could just be about a writer or person who is lonely in stanza 1, but then their thoughts are filled with company of the rest of nature - as Aley says the daffodils are welcoming hosts. I think that the daffodils and the rest of the nature they describe are kind of daydreams because in the end of the poem they're still sitting alone on their couch (and say they flash upon the inward eye), but the speaker is not so alone anymore because they have these dreams of nature. The dreams as I said could also be writing, so a poet is never really alone because they have their art or their craft to fill their mind.

I think the interpretation of writers block or the poem being something about writing seems to be a reasonable interpretation from the last stanza too.

BluesClues Officer

BluesClues · Nov 9, 2017

I can definitely see Aley's deeper reading, although I'd be impressed if Wordsworth came back to life and was like, "Wow, you're the first person ever to understand that that was really what I was talking about, and not just 'nature is pretty'!" I can definitely see a correlation between the ephemeral nature of daffodils and the ephemeral nature of clouds.

(But I have trouble thinking this is really what he actually meant.)

I had something else to add to this conversation but now I don't remember, because I was working on other things and having discussions at the same time.

Oh, but I do remember that I wanted to say it's just not as good as "Ode."

Aley Creator

Aley · Nov 9, 2017

I should mark this up and find the structure...

Aley Creator

Aley · Nov 9, 2017

Alright, so I marked up the first two stanzas and then it was really obvious that it continued throughout the rest of the poem the same, so here's how far I got

I WAN-dered LON-ely as a CLOUD 8 a
That FLOATS on HIGH o'er VALES and HILLS, 8 b
When ALL at ONCE I SAW a CROWD, 8 a
A HOST, of GOL-den DAF-fo-DILS; 8 b
Be-SIDE the LAKE, be-NEATH the TREES, 8c
FLUT-ter-ing and DANC-ing in the BREEZE. 9c [Flut-ring and danc-ing in the breeze 8 c]

Con-tin-u-ous as the stars that shine 9 d [Con-tin-yus as the stars that shine 8 d]
And twin-kle on the mil-ky way, 8 e
They stret-ched in ne-ver-en-ding line 9 d [They stretched[? there's no aspiration which makes me think it might not be two syllables] in the ne-ver-end-ing line 8 d]
A-long the mar-gin of a bay: 8 e
Ten thou-sand saw I at a glance, 8 f
TOS-sing their HEADS in SPRIGHT-ly DANCE. 8 f

The waves be-side them danc-ed; but they 9 e [the waves be-side them dancd; but they 8 e]
Out-did the spark-ling waves in glee: 8 g
A po-et could not but be gay, 8 e
In such a joc-und com-pa-ny: 8 g [I used google for the pronunciation of jocund because I didn't recognize the word.]
I gazed—and gazed—but lit-tle thought 8 h
What WEALTH the SHOW to ME had BROUGHT: 8 h

For oft, when on my couch I lie 8 i
In va-cant or in pen-sive mood, 8 j
They flash up-on that in-ward eye 8 i
Which is the bliss of sol-i-tude; 8 j
And then my heart with plea-sure fills, 8 k
And DANC-es with the DAF-fo-DILS. 8 k

As you can see, some of the lines are up in the air so I included both options. Either we believe he's expecting us to have his accent, which is highly likely, or we go with my accent and it's a little skewed. This is one of the beauties of looking at old structure in modern settings. We don't have that accent anymore!

For instance in Edmund Spenser's writings, we could get "oer" for the word "over" but today we get o-ver which is two syllables versus "Oer" which is one.

ANYWAY, I find it interesting that the stresses are a little messed up too. because we don't say "tossING" we say "TOSSing" The root word has the stress. That being said, I checked for this same syncopation in the other last lines of the stanzas and I didn't find it.

This is a good example of iambic tetrameter though, despite those edits. It's actually a good example because they're there. If you have perfect meter, then you can't see what old poets like Wordsworth used to do to stuff in their syllables when they need less important words. They include syllables like "with" and "the" and let the unstressed beat accumulate words. I doubt if I finished this I would have two stressed beats right next to one another because that would break the syncopation of the iambic meter, however, there would be unstressed beats next to each other.

* Unstressed beats are less important =D

I also find this interesting because it reminded me of a sonnet, but a sonnet wouldn't be a real sonnet because a sonnet is quatrains and then a sestet, and this is just the sestet part of that, the ababcc part. it's two quatrains, abab or abba and then one sestet ababcc if it's a shakespearean sonnet, or abbacc, or abcabc, and one of those is the italian sonnet.

This is just that sestet repeated four times.

Alright, so I marked up the first two stanzas and then it was really obvious that it continued throughout the rest of the poem the same, so here's how far I got

[quote]I WAN-dered LON-ely as a CLOUD 8 a
That FLOATS on HIGH o'er VALES and HILLS, 8 b 
When ALL at ONCE I SAW a CROWD, 8 a 
A HOST, of GOL-den DAF-fo-DILS; 8 b
Be-SIDE the LAKE, be-NEATH the TREES, 8c 
FLUT-ter-ing and DANC-ing in the BREEZE. 9c [Flut-ring and danc-ing in the breeze 8 c]

Con-tin-u-ous as the stars that shine 9 d [Con-tin-yus as the stars that shine 8 d]
And twin-kle on the mil-ky way, 8 e
They stret-ched in ne-ver-en-ding line 9 d [They stretched[? there's no aspiration which makes me think it might not be two syllables] in the ne-ver-end-ing line 8 d]
A-long the mar-gin of a bay: 8 e
Ten thou-sand saw I at a glance, 8 f
TOS-sing their HEADS in SPRIGHT-ly DANCE. 8 f

The waves be-side them danc-ed; but they 9 e [the waves be-side them dancd; but they 8 e]
Out-did the spark-ling waves in glee: 8 g
A po-et could not but be gay, 8 e
In such a joc-und com-pa-ny: 8 g [I used google for  the pronunciation of jocund because I didn't recognize the word.]
I gazed—and gazed—but lit-tle thought 8 h
What WEALTH the SHOW to ME had BROUGHT: 8 h

For oft, when on my couch I lie 8 i
In va-cant or in pen-sive mood, 8 j
They flash up-on that in-ward eye 8 i
Which is the bliss of sol-i-tude; 8 j
And then my heart with plea-sure fills, 8 k
And DANC-es with the DAF-fo-DILS. 8 k[/quote]

As you can see, some of the lines are up in the air so I included both options. Either we believe he's expecting us to have his accent, which is highly likely, or we go with my accent and it's a little skewed. This is one of the beauties of looking at old structure in modern settings. We don't have that accent anymore!

For instance in Edmund Spenser's writings, we could get "oer" for the word "over" but today we get o-ver which is two syllables versus "Oer" which is one.

ANYWAY, I find it interesting that the stresses are a little messed up too. because we don't say "tossING" we say "TOSSing" The root word has the stress. That being said, I checked for this same syncopation in the other last lines of the stanzas and I didn't find it.

This is a good example of iambic tetrameter though, despite those edits. It's actually a good example because they're there. If you have perfect meter, then you can't see what old poets like Wordsworth used to do to stuff in their syllables when they need less important words. They include syllables like "with" and "the" and let the unstressed beat accumulate words. I doubt if I finished this I would have two stressed beats right next to one another because that would break the syncopation of the iambic meter, however, there would be unstressed beats next to each other.

* Unstressed beats are less important =D

I also find this interesting because it reminded me of a sonnet, but a sonnet wouldn't be a real sonnet because a sonnet is quatrains and then a sestet, and this is just the sestet part of that, the ababcc part. it's two quatrains, abab or abba and then one sestet ababcc if it's a shakespearean sonnet, or abbacc, or abcabc, and one of those is the italian sonnet.

This is just that sestet repeated four times.

Lumi

Lumi · Nov 12, 2017

I find it nice that he began by painting a dreamscape--read: escape by daydreaming--to this gorgeous natural habitat that would enrapture the eye of any onlooker. He made a gorgeous picture, and though I believe he could've done so with or without rhyme and meter (because I'm a bully to rhyme and meter) he definitely showed off a keen set of skills by not forcing his rhymes or meter by enlisting techniques such as enjambment and inversion.

Criticisms coming in a bit.

In the latter portion of the poem, we find that he himself relies on this dreamscape when in a pensive state, perhaps even stressed, to give inspiration, relaxation, or succor from his worries. And I imagine it'd work really dang well given the beauty of it.

Negative points: because of the meter I felt like I was reading a children's poem; because of the old school means of capitalizing each line, I feel like reviewing him and teaching him the falsehood of his belief, tho obviously I can't. Poor fellow.

All in all, it made me feel chill, but it also made me want to take a red pen to it.

I find it nice that he began by painting a dreamscape--read: escape by daydreaming--to this gorgeous natural habitat that would enrapture the eye of any onlooker. He made a gorgeous picture, and though I believe he could've done so with or without rhyme and meter (because I'm a bully to rhyme and meter) he definitely showed off a keen set of skills by not forcing his rhymes or meter by enlisting techniques such as enjambment and inversion.

Criticisms coming in a bit.

In the latter portion of the poem, we find that he himself relies on this dreamscape when in a pensive state, perhaps even stressed, to give inspiration, relaxation, or succor from his worries. And I imagine it'd work really dang well given the beauty of it.

Negative points: because of the meter I felt like I was reading a children's poem; because of the old school means of capitalizing each line, I feel like reviewing him and teaching him the falsehood of his belief, tho obviously I can't. Poor fellow.

All in all, it made me feel chill, but it also made me want to take a red pen to it.

alliyah Admin

alliyah · Nov 12, 2017

I also certainly felt a "nursery-rhyme" vibe from this piece, as Lumi mentions the "children's poem" feeling to it - maybe because the innocent little cloud metaphor in the beginning and then the constant rhyme and meter as well.

I wonder if he'd started with some of the themes/content of the last stanza if this would have been more effective, and maybe received less as a childish poem. Because after reading the first stanza I kind of dismissed the rest as some cute little nature poem without reading much into it (on my first and second reading). However I think the last stanza certainly does have some deeper meaning, maybe because the metaphors and images finally find their roots in human-lived experience and reality by the last stanza. I think I personally would have been less likely to dismiss the poem upon a first reading if it had started out with the image of the speaker sitting alone on a couch rather than imagining themselves as a lonely little cloud.

BluesClues Officer

BluesClues · Nov 12, 2017

Yeah, I agree with @alliyah that it would feel like there was more to read into it if it had started with some of the potentially deeper things. Although on that note, the last stanza doesn't take the potentially deeper things very far, since he's just like, "But all I have to do when I get pensive is think about these daffodils!"

But still.

Or I could maybe see if he went further with the celestial bodies thing - that really stood out to me, just because it was something different than "here's some pretty trees, here's some pretty flowers, here's some pretty waves," even though it was still a natural image and something beautiful.

Aley Creator

Aley · Nov 12, 2017

I think you guys are missing a bit of the context here.

This is a writer who created an era of poetry, and while it isn't our era that we're currently in, it is still an era of learning and developing as poets. We currently have a contemporary view on poetry because we fought back against the need for proper punctuation and line capitalization from poets like Wordsworth.

Moreover, Wordsworth is among the poets who was fighting back against needing everything to sound shakespearean and sound like it was in old english. In the end, his type of poetry was butchered and used for children's nursery rhymes, and schoolhouse teaching, and therefor we feel that effect today and cringe when we hear it, but at the time, it was the movement of poetry. That's where it was when the French Revolution was going on.

I can overlook the tight hold on structure, and appreciate what the structure tells us, because I can understand that to be where we are, we had to have been where we were, and I hope that you guys can do the same.

This was a master at his craft. This was a person who delicately chose every syllable, every sound, and every line to create his persuasive argument, and although we cannot glean much of that argument all the time, I think we've hit upon a lot of it.

I think our @LadyLizz can tell us if I'm anywhere on the mark anyways.

I think you guys are missing a bit of the context here.

This is a writer who created an era of poetry, and while it isn't our era that we're currently in, it is still an era of learning and developing as poets. We currently have a contemporary view on poetry because we fought back against the need for proper punctuation and line capitalization from poets like Wordsworth.

Moreover, Wordsworth is among the poets who was fighting back against needing everything to sound shakespearean and sound like it was in old english. In the end, his type of poetry was butchered and used for children's nursery rhymes, and schoolhouse teaching, and therefor we feel that effect today and cringe when we hear it, but at the time, it was the movement of poetry. That's where it was when the French Revolution was going on.

I can overlook the tight hold on structure, and appreciate what the structure tells us, because I can understand that to be where we are, we had to have been where we were, and I hope that you guys can do the same.

This was a master at his craft. This was a person who delicately chose every syllable, every sound, and every line to create his persuasive argument, and although we cannot glean much of that argument all the time, I think we've hit upon a lot of it.

I think our @LadyLizz can tell us if I'm anywhere on the mark anyways.

William Wordsworth - "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud"

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