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“Ode to the West Wind” (1819) Percy Bysshe Shelley I. 1 O ..., Summaries of Voice

Thy voice, and suddenly grow gray with fear,. And tremble and despoil themselves: oh hear! “Ode to the West Wind” can be found on pages 783-785 in The Language ...

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Odes
“Ode to the West Wind” (1819)
Percy Bysshe Shelley
I.
1 O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn's being,
Thou, from whose unseen presence the leaves dead
Are driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing,
Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red,
5 Pestilence-stricken multitudes: O thou,
Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed
The wingéd seeds, where they lie cold and low,
Each like a corpse within its grave, until
Thine azure sister of the Spring shall blow
10 Her clarion o'er the dreaming earth, and fill
(Driving sweet buds like flocks to feed in air)
With living hues and odours plain and hill:
Wild Spirit, which art moving everywhere;
Destroyer and preserver; hear, oh hear!
II.
15 Thou on whose stream, mid the steep sky's commotion,
Loose clouds like earth's decaying leaves are shed,
Shook from the tangled boughs of Heaven and Ocean,
Angels of rain and lightning: there are spread
On the blue surface of thine aëry surge,
20 Like the bright hair uplifted from the head
Of some fierce Maenad, even from the dim verge
Of the horizon to the zenith's height,
The locks of the approaching storm. Thou dirge
Of the dying year, to which this closing night
25 Will be the dome of a vast sepulcher,
Vaulted with all thy congregated might
Of vapors, from whose solid atmosphere
Black rain, and fire, and hail will burst: oh hear!
III.
Thou who didst waken from his summer dreams
30 The blue Mediterranean, where he lay,
Lulled by the coil of his crystálline streams,
Beside a pumice isle in Baiae's bay,
And saw in sleep old palaces and towers
Quivering within the wave's intenser day,
35 All overgrown with azure moss and flowers
So sweet, the sense faints picturing them! Thou
For whose path the Atlantic's level powers
Cleave themselves into chasms, while far below
The sea-blooms and the oozy woods which wear
40 The sapless foliage of the ocean, know
Thy voice, and suddenly grow gray with fear,
And tremble and despoil themselves: oh hear!
“Ode to the West Wind” can be found on pages 783-785 in The Language of Literature: British Literature.
Helpful Information:
3 enchanter: magician, wizard, sorcerer
4 hectic: feverish, energetic
5 pestilence: plague, illness
6 chariotest: retreats, leaves
9 azure: bright blue color
Sister of the Spring: South wind of spring,
which revives everything that has died in winter
10 clarion: a trumpet with a clear, ringing tone
12 plain: an open area similar to a field or
meadow
15 mid: amid, between
17 boughs: branches
19 aëry: airy
20-23 The speaker is saying that the clouds lie
in streaks, looking like the streaming hair of a
maenad a wildly dancing female worshipper of
Dionysus, the Greek god of wine.
23 dirge: funeral song
25 sepulcher: tomb
26 congregated might: collective strength
31 crystalline streams: the different-colored
transparent currents of the Mediterranean Sea
32 pumice: a light volcanic rock
Baiae’s bay: the Bay of Naples, site of the
ancient Roman resort of Baiae
37-38 You (still addressing West Wind) for
whose path the surface of the Atlantic Ocean
breaks in two (creates waves)…
39-40 sea-blooms, oozy woods, sapless
foliage: describing various plants that grow in
the ocean, including seaweed
42 despoil: plunder, steal, pillage
oh hear: listen
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Odes

“Ode to the West Wind” (1819)

Percy Bysshe Shelley

I.

1 O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn's being,

Thou, from whose unseen presence the leaves dead

Are driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing,

Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red,

5 Pestilence-stricken multitudes: O thou,

Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed

The wingéd seeds, where they lie cold and low,

Each like a corpse within its grave, until

Thine azure sister of the Spring shall blow

10 Her clarion o'er the dreaming earth, and fill

(Driving sweet buds like flocks to feed in air)

With living hues and odours plain and hill:

Wild Spirit, which art moving everywhere;

Destroyer and preserver; hear, oh hear!

II.

15 Thou on whose stream, mid the steep sky's commotion,

Loose clouds like earth's decaying leaves are shed,

Shook from the tangled boughs of Heaven and Ocean,

Angels of rain and lightning: there are spread

On the blue surface of thine aëry surge,

20 Like the bright hair uplifted from the head

Of some fierce Maenad, even from the dim verge

Of the horizon to the zenith's height,

The locks of the approaching storm. Thou dirge

Of the dying year, to which this closing night

25 Will be the dome of a vast sepulcher,

Vaulted with all thy congregated might

Of vapors, from whose solid atmosphere

Black rain, and fire, and hail will burst: oh hear!

III.

Thou who didst waken from his summer dreams

30 The blue Mediterranean, where he lay,

Lulled by the coil of his crystálline streams,

Beside a pumice isle in Baiae's bay,

And saw in sleep old palaces and towers

Quivering within the wave's intenser day,

35 All overgrown with azure moss and flowers

So sweet, the sense faints picturing them! Thou

For whose path the Atlantic's level powers

Cleave themselves into chasms, while far below

The sea-blooms and the oozy woods which wear

40 The sapless foliage of the ocean, know

Thy voice, and suddenly grow gray with fear,

And tremble and despoil themselves: oh hear!

“Ode to the West Wind” can be found on pages 783- 785 in The Language of Literature: British Literature****. Helpful Information: 3 enchanter: magician, wizard, sorcerer 4 hectic: feverish, energetic 5 pestilence: plague, illness 6 chariotest: retreats, leaves 9 azure: bright blue color Sister of the Spring: South wind of spring, which revives everything that has died in winter 10 clarion: a trumpet with a clear, ringing tone 12 plain: an open area similar to a field or meadow 15 mid: amid, between 17 boughs: branches 19 aëry: airy 20 - 23 The speaker is saying that the clouds lie in streaks, looking like the streaming hair of a maenad – a wildly dancing female worshipper of Dionysus, the Greek god of wine. 23 dirge: funeral song 25 sepulcher: tomb 26 congregated might: collective strength 31 crystalline streams: the different-colored transparent currents of the Mediterranean Sea 32 pumice: a light volcanic rock Baiae’s bay: the Bay of Naples, site of the ancient Roman resort of Baiae 37 - 38 You (still addressing West Wind) for whose path the surface of the Atlantic Ocean breaks in two (creates waves)… 39 - 40 sea-blooms, oozy woods, sapless foliage: describing various plants that grow in the ocean, including seaweed 42 despoil: plunder, steal, pillage oh hear: listen

“Ode to the West Wind” (1819) - continued

Percy Bysshe Shelley

IV.

If I were a dead leaf thou mightest bear;

If I were a swift cloud to fly with thee;

45 A wave to pant beneath thy power, and share

The impulse of thy strength, only less free

Than thou, O uncontrollable! If even

I were as in my boyhood, and could be

The comrade of thy wanderings over Heaven,

50 As then, when to outstrip thy skyey speed

Scarce seemed a vision; I would never have striven

As thus with thee in prayer in my sore need.

Oh, lift me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud!

I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed!

55 A heavy weight of hours has chained and bowed

One too like thee: tameless, and swift, and proud.

V.

Make me thy lyre, even as the forest is:

What if my leaves are falling like its own!

The tumult of thy mighty harmonies

60 Will take from both a deep, autumnal tone,

Sweet though in sadness. Be thou, Spirit fierce,

My spirit! Be thou me, impetuous one!

Drive my dead thoughts over the universe

Like withered leaves to quicken a new birth!

65 And, by the incantation of this verse,

Scatter, as from an unextinguished hearth

Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind!

Be through my lips to unawakened earth

The trumpet of a prophecy! O Wind,

70 If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?

“Ode to the West Wind” can be found on pages 783- 785 in The Language of Literature: British Literature****. Helpful Information: 50 thy skyey speed: the swiftness of clouds moving quickly across the sky 51 vision: an impossibility 52 sore: desperate, extreme 57 lyre: a reference to the Aeolian harp, an instrument whose strings make music when the wind blows over them 59 tumult: uproar, commotion 62 impetuous: violently forceful; impulsive 65 incantation: recitation (like a spell)

“To a Skylark” (1820)

Percy Bysshe Shelley

Hail to thee, blithe Spirit!

Bird thou never wert,

That from Heaven, or near it,

Pourest thy full heart

In profuse strains of unpremeditated art. 5

Higher still and higher

From the earth thou springest

Like a cloud of fire;

The blue deep thou wingest,

And singing still dost soar, and soaring ever singest. 10

In the golden lightning

Of the sunken sun,

O'er which clouds are bright'ning,

Thou dost float and run;

Like an unbodied joy whose race is just begun. 15

The pale purple even

Melts around thy flight;

Like a star of Heaven,

In the broad day-light

Thou art unseen, but yet I hear thy shrill delight, 20

Keen as are the arrows

Of that silver sphere,

Whose intense lamp narrows

In the white dawn clear

Until we hardly see, we feel that it is there. 25

All the earth and air

With thy voice is loud,

As, when night is bare,

From one lonely cloud

The moon rains out her beams, and Heaven is overflow'd. 30

What thou art we know not;

What is most like thee?

From rainbow clouds there flow not

Drops so bright to see

As from thy presence showers a rain of melody. 35

Like a Poet hidden

In the light of thought,

Singing hymns unbidden,

Till the world is wrought

To sympathy with hopes and fears it heeded not: 40

Like a high-born maiden

In a palace-tower,

Soothing her love-laden

Soul in secret hour

With music sweet as love, which overflows her bower: 45

Like a glow-worm golden

In a dell of dew,

Scattering unbeholden

Its real hue

Among the flowers and grass, which screen it from the view: 50

“To a Skylark” can be found on pages 786 - 9 in The Language of Literature: British Literature. Helpful Information: 1 blithe: carefree 2 wert: were

5 unpremeditated: natural; not

planned out ahead of time 16 even: evening 22 silver sphere: the planet Venus, often called the morning star because it is visible in the east just before daybreak 45 bower: private room; boudoir