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To summer by William Blake. Can anyone explain this poem?
To summer William Blake
O thou who passest thro' our valleys in
Thy strength, curb thy fierce steeds, allay the heat
That flames from their large nostrils! thou, O Summer,
Oft pitched'st here thy goldent tent, and oft
Beneath our oaks hast slept, while we beheld
With joy thy ruddy limbs and flourishing hair.
Beneath our thickest shades we oft have heard
Thy voice, when noon upon his fervid car
Rode o'er the deep of heaven; beside our springs
Sit down, and in our mossy valleys, on
Some bank beside a river clear, throw thy
Silk draperies off, and rush into the stream:
Our valleys love the Summer in his pride.
Our bards are fam'd who strike the silver wire:
Our youth are bolder than the southern swains:
Our maidens fairer in the sprightly dance:
We lack not songs, nor instruments of joy,
Nor echoes sweet, nor waters clear as heaven,
Nor laurel wreaths against the sultry heat.
I am not the best at English and I need help understanding this poem.
please!
This is actually a quite difficult poem, and if you are reading it in school, I have to say I am impressed.
You need to pay attention to the title (and ignore the note somebody posted above about tourism); otherwise the poem makes no sense. It is addressed to a personified god of summer. He is imagined by the poet as riding fierce steeds (line 2) with flaming nostrils (line 3). The poet surprisingly invokes him to `allay the heat.' That is, this whole poem is a complaint that summer is too hot! But the poem gets even stranger in line 4.
While the first three lines beg the summer to be less hot, starting at the fourth line, and into the entire second stanza, the poem goes into reminiscence. The poet says the summer, `Oft' (or often) `pitched here [its] golden tent,' and `oft... has slept,' etc. These lines, such as `golden tent' seem to have much nicer connotations than the `flaming nostrils.' The poet has begun to remember previous summers which hot, but not too hot. These lines, and the entire second stanza, are about a `just right' summer.
If you read the second stanza, you'll see all of the imagery is still summery-- one does not swim in winter; yet it is all pleasant and cooling. None of this is taking place in reality, but in the poet's imagination. Initially (line 7) he says `oft' for previous summers; but the fourth line of the second stanza begins a new invocation, or an invitation to `sit down,' and so on, to cool off. The poet says that our valleys `love the Summer in his pride.' This is flattery and a paradox-- probably the summer's pride is to be very hot. Yet obviously what the valleys love is the medium hot summer.
The third stanza does read as a tourist guide. It talks about our poets (bards), and boys (youths), and girls (maidens). Crucial in this stanza is really `bards--' this is one of these poems about poetry. The last line sums it up: we lack not `laurel wreaths against the sultry heat.' An astonishing line! Laurel wreaths are traditionally prizes for poets, and symbolise the power of poetry. The last line asserts outright that we will use poetry to temper the heat of summer-- `against the sultry heat.' He is talking about this poem itself, as an incantation, or the spell, which oft lured the summer to sleep so many years in the past. And he is saying he is going to do it again, to make the prophecy of the second stanza come true once more this year.
Blake is a strange poet, and this is not a traditional seasonal poem. I should mention it is part of a cycle of four poems, with one for each season. They are all very unorthodox, and also rarely read. Congratulations for stumbling across such an interesting poem, however you've managed it. I have very great affection for this seasonal cycle.
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