RPO -- William Wordsworth : I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud

William Wordsworth (1770-1850)

I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud

1I wandered lonely as a cloud

2That floats on high o'er vales and hills,

3When all at once I saw a crowd,

4A host, of golden daffodils;

5Beside the lake, beneath the trees,

6Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

7Continuous as the stars that shine

8And twinkle on the milky way,

9They stretched in never-ending line

10Along the margin of a bay:

11Ten thousand saw I at a glance,

12Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

13The waves beside them danced; but they

14Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:

15A poet could not but be gay,

16In such a jocund company:

17I gazed--and gazed--but little thought

18What wealth the show to me had brought:

19For oft, when on my couch I lie

20In vacant or in pensive mood,

21They flash upon that inward eye

22Which is the bliss of solitude;

23And then my heart with pleasure fills,

24And dances with the daffodils.

Notes

1] Wordsworth made use of the description in his sister's diary, as well as of his memory of the daffodils in Gowbarrow Park, by Ullswater. Cf. Dorothy Wordsworth's Journal, April 15, 1802: "I never saw daffodils so beautiful. They grew among the mossy stones . . .; some rested their heads upon these stones, as on a pillow for weariness; and the rest tossed and reeled and danced, and seemed as if they verily laughed with the wind, that blew upon them over the lake; they looked so gay, ever glancing, ever changing." For this reason, some readers will know this poem as "Daffodils," a title used, for instance, by Arthur Quiller-Couch in his edition, The Oxford Book of English Verse: 1250–1900 (1919): no. 530.

21-22] Wordsworth said that these were the two best lines in the poem and that they were composed by his wife.

Online text copyright © 2009, Ian Lancashire (the Department of English) and the University of Toronto.
Published by the Web Development Group, Information Technology Services, University of Toronto Libraries.

Original text: William Wordsworth, Poems in Two Volumes (1807). See The Manuscript of William Wordsworth's Poems, in Two Volumes (1807): A Facsimile (London: British Library, 1984). bib MASS (Massey College Library, Toronto).
RPO poem editor: J. R. MacGillivray
RP edition: 3RP 2.383.
Recent editing: 2:2002/3/15*1:2006/8/13

Composition date: 1804
Rhyme: ababcc

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