A Slumber did my Spirit Seal by William Wordsworth

 

A Slumber did my Spirit Seal

BY William Wordsworth 

A slumber did my spirit seal;

I had no human fears:

She seemed a thing that could not feel

The touch of earthly years.

 

No motion has she now, no force;

She neither hears nor sees;

Rolled round in earth's diurnal course,

With rocks, and stones, and trees.

William Wordsworth

William Wordsworth is the founder of the Romantic Movement of English literature.  He is one of the most remarkable English Poet.  He is a poet of nature. He is known as Lakeland Poet because he lived in that area.  This place is full of beautiful landscapes, green pastures and numerous lakes.  He is called as nature poet.  For he focusses the relationship between the nature and the humans.  He became the Poet Laureate of England in 1843.  His lyrical Ballads are well known in the literature world.  His “Slumber did my Spirit Seal is another successful work of William Wordsworth which brings out the Universal truth to the world.  He was a great poet and Poet Laureate from 1843 until his death from Pleurisy on 23 April 1850.

 

Summary of the poem

The word “Slumber” literally means deep sleep.  The poet refers to death that fills his heart after the demise of his beloved.  He is full of pain and grief. He suffers a lot with pain. He could not escape from his sorrows, sufferings and depressions.  His body refuses to move as he is numb to the core due to his mental agony. He soon realizes the reality of life. He shows different approach to the reality of life and death.  He shares his realization with his readers.  He accepts that the death is inevitable and that is the eternal truth.

 

Detail Analysis

Stanza 1

“A slumber did my spirit seal;

I had no human fears:

She seemed a thing that could not feel

The touch of earthly years.”

 This first stanza with four lines express the grief of the poet over the demise of his beloved.  He is shocked and could not accept the death of his beloved.   He feels the pain and says that his soul has gone into a deep sleep.  “Slumber” is the word used to describe his situation. The deep sleep keeps him calm, and he feels he is free from all fears of human life and death.  He has become completely numb to the core.  He has no feeling or fear for the materialistic world. 
The death of his beloved makes him senseless.  His beloved after her death becomes a thing to him as the dead body could not feel anything on Earth.  She has no fear for life or death now.  She is now beyond physical existence. For she is no more in this world and has no connection to the human bonds.  He sees her as an eternal and has no end to her spirit.

 Stanza 2

 “No motion has she now, no force;

She neither hears nor sees;

Rolled round in earth's diurnal course,

With rocks, and stones, and trees.”

In the second stanza the poet has given a frightening description of his beloved’s situation.  She is dead and has no life in her.  She is blind and deaf as she is lifeless.   She is beyond existence.  She has no movement or energy.  By the description, the poet expresses how the lady was active in the past.  May be she was full of life.  But now she has become part of the rocks, stones and the trees.  She is rolling with it in its course. Stones and the rocks have no difference.  They both refers to her gravestones.  She is a dead thing on a living things like trees.  Non-living over the living thing brings out the view of the poet over the situation.  She has become the integral part of the nature.  Now she is seen in the nature, and could be felt.

 Literary devices

The title says the situation of the poet.  Slumber keeps his calm due to his acceptance of reality of life and death.

The form is two stanzas which consist of four lines each.

Rhyming is ABAB CDCD

Tone of the poem is sad and it shifts from pain to the acceptance of the reality of life.

Theme is human bondage with nature, human life cycle, accepting the natural course of life.

First person narration.

Poems communicate with its readers through the figure of speech or its literary devices. Some of the important features are

Metaphor 

It is a figure of speech in which a word refers to one kind of object to another. There is a comparison between the speaker’s refusals to accept of his beloved death and the sleep which sealed his spirit.   “A slumber did my spirit seal” which refers to his mental condition.

 Personification

Slumber which is a slight Sleep helps him to close his soul.

Alliteration

Repeating of the same letter or sound.  In the first line the “s” is repeated in “slumber, spirit, and seal).  “R” sound in “Roll’d round in earth’s diurnal course” is a good example.

Image

Image refers to a verbal description to bring out the actual event to the senses of the readers. The description of the death of his beloved as “Roll’d round in earth’s diurnal course with rocks, and stones, and trees” gives a vivid picture to the readers.  The body and soul of the demised beloved become one with nature.

Irony

The different meanings for one word to give a humorous effect. “ no motion or force and she is revolving with the earth around the sun refers to her death.   She is one with nature without life in her.  but the poet is alive but he is  in half sleep and he is away from nature

Symbol

Word or image used to represent an object or something other than itself.  “Slumber” refers to half sleep which closes his spirit.

The poem is an “elegy” in which the poet laments the death of his beloved.  The language used to express the grief of the poet is quite complex.  It differs from ordinary language. 

Thus the two stanzas describe the pain, suffering and grief of the poet who is numb to see the death of his beloved in the first stanza and realises the eternal truth of human cycle. Life and death cannot be separated they are part of the human life.

 slumbering....

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