Ode to the West Wind By Percy Bysshe Shelley
I
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,
Pestilence-stricken multitudes: O thou,
Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed
The winged seeds, where they lie cold and low,
Each like a corpse within its grave, until
Thine azure sister of the Spring shall blow
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
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,
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
Will be the dome of a vast sepulchre,
Vaulted with all thy congregated might
Of vapours, from whose solid atmosphere
Black rain, and fire, and hail will burst: oh hear!
III
Thou who didst waken from his summer dreams
The blue Mediterranean, where he lay,
Lull'd by the coil of his cryst� lline streams,
Beside a pumice isle in Baiae's bay,
And saw in sleep old palaces and towers
Quivering within the wave's intenser day,
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
The sapless foliage of the ocean, know
Thy voice, and suddenly grow gray with fear,
And tremble and despoil themselves: oh hear!
IV
If I were a dead leaf thou mightest bear;
If I were a swift cloud to fly with thee;
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,
As then, when to outstrip thy skiey speed
Scarce seem'd a vision; I would ne'er 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!
A heavy weight of hours has chain'd and bow'd
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
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 wither'd leaves to quicken a new birth!
And, by the incantation of this verse,
Scatter, as from an unextinguish'd hearth
Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind!
Be through my lips to unawaken'd earth
The trumpet of a prophecy! O Wind,
If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?
Percy Bysshe Shelley wrote "Ode to the West Wind" in 1819 while living in Florence, Italy. To be exact, when he published the poem with his unperformable play Prometheus Unbound in 1820, he claimed in a footnote to have written "Ode to the West Wind" while sitting in the woods near the Arno River on a windy day in October. Lucky man, we say, but although he loved Italy, he was feeling depressed about being detached from the political and social scene back in his native England. Many critics have suggested that this poem relates to that sense of powerlessness.
As a political, religious, and literary radical, Shelley was heavily invested in his own ability to influence society. Some poets need solitude and privacy and a retreat in the woods to do their best work, but Shelley needed stimulating arguments and social action. "Ode to the West Wind" is one of the poems in which he considers the role and power of the poet or philosopher to spread new ideas and effect change. It’s also, though you might find this difficult to believe, one of Shelley’s more accessible poems. Its brevity, smooth tone, and straightforward use of natural imagery present his abstract ideas about philosophy and poetry in a compact way. Think of it as Shelley’s own summary of himself – or at least one aspect of himself.
Stanza 1
The poet addresses the west wind as "Wild" and the "Breath of Autumn's Being." It is a powerful force which drives the dead leaves which are yellow, black, pale and hectic red, to distant places like ghosts from an enchanter. The west wind carries winged seeds to their dark wintery beds underground which remain there till the west winds sister in the spring season blows and these seeds then blossom into sweet, scented flowers. The earth then will be alive with these living lives or colours and scents or fragrances. In this way the west wind acts both as a Destroyer and Preserver.
Stanza 2
The Shelley describes the powerful effect of the west wind in the sky. The west wind brakes away the "Clouds" like earth's decaying leaves from the boughs of Heaven. After being plucked, these assume the fierce posture of black rain and hail. These rain clouds are compared to the outspread hair covering the sky from its horizon to its zenith. The wildness and confusion in the sky is compared to some fierce Maenad, the worshipper of Bacchus, the Greek God of wine. Maenad worships god in a frenzied fashion, uplifting her hair like tangled clouds. These indicate the approaching storm.
The West Wind becomes a dirge (funeral song) which is being sung for the dying year. The night becomes a vast tomb where vapours have been built like arches and will soon come down as rain and hail. Stanza 3
The west wind blows over the blue Mediterranean sea which has been described as a vast sleepy snake, which dreams of old civilization (palaces and towers) rich in flowers and vegetation. The sea sees "old palaces and towers" in sleep, which quiver when the west wind blows. Both the Mediterranean and the Atlantic seas are affected by the West Wind. The Atlantic's surface gets cut into chasms to make way for the West Wind and the vegetation below the surface trembles in fear at the force of the west wind.
Stanza 4
The West Wind now becomes a personal force. The poet says that if he were a dead leaf, a swift cloud, a wave, he could experience the West Wind's power and its strength. In his childhood, the poet had the power and strength and could probably out speed the west wind, but now he (the poet) no longer has the strength as he has been weakened by the problem, and burdens of life and he is no longer "tame less,", "swift" and "proud" as he used to be in his childhood. He is blushing as he has fallen on the thorns of life - meaning he is facing many problems/crisis in his life which has drawn away all his strength and power; and he is now looking up to the west wind, requesting him for his help.
Stanza 5
Despair and trauma which the poet is experiencing now gives way to a new hope. Shelly offers himself to the west wind in the same way as the sky, the ocean and the forests do. He asks the west wind to be the musician who can take out a deep autumnal tone from him and maker harmoniums music from him in the forest. The poet offers himself to the west wind to be used as a "lyre" for this purpose. The music thus produced may be sad but sweet. The poet then goes on to compare himself to an unextinguished fireplace with ashes and sparks - meaning that the poet still has some unburnt power in him. He requests the west wind to spread this power like it spreads 'ashes' and 'sparks' among mankind.
The poet ends with the hope that the west wind will carry the poet's words over the entire universe and be the trumpet of his prophecy. Winter is symbolic of despair, coldness and death; but spring gives hope to new life, birth beauty and colour. If there is despair now, hope is very close by so the poet says - if winter comes, can spring be far behind. If there is despair and hopelessness now, there is hope and optimism close at hand
.Examples of Figures of Speech and Rhetorical DevicesStanza 1
Alliteration: wild West Wind (line 1).
Apostrophe, Personification: Throughout the poem, the poet addresses the west wind as if it were a person.
Metaphor: Comparison of the west wind to breath of Autumn's being (line 1).
Metaphor: Comparison of autumn to a living, breathing creature (line 1).
Anastrophe: leaves dead (line 2). Anastrophe is inversion of the normal word order, as in a man forgotten (instead of a forgotten man) or as in the opening lines of Samuel Taylor Coleridge's "Kubla Kahn": In Xanada did Kubla Kahn / A stately pleasure dome decree (instead of In Xanadu, Kubla Kahn decreed a stately pleasure dome). Here is another example, made up to demonstrate the inverted word order of anastrophe:
In the garden green and dewy
A rose I plucked for Huey
Simile: Comparison of dead leaves to ghosts.
Anastrophe: enchanter fleeing (line 3).
Alliteration: Pestilence-stricken multitudes (line 5).
Alliteration: Pestilence-stricken multitudes (line 5).
Alliteration: chariotest to (line 6).
Alliteration: The wingèd seeds, where they (line 7).
Metaphor: Comparison of seeds to flying creatures (line 7).
Simile: Comparison of each seed to a corpse (lines 7-8).
Alliteration: sister of the Spring (line 9).
Personification: Comparison of spring wind to a person (lines 9-10).
Metaphor, Personification: Comparison of earth to a dreamer (line 10).
Alliteration: flocks to feed
Simile: Comparison of buds to flocks (line 11).
Anastrophe: fill / . . . With living hues and odours plain and hill (lines 10, 12).
Alliteration: Wild Spirit, which (line 13).
Paradox: Destroyer and preserver (line 14).
Alliteration: hear, O hear (line 14). Stanza 8
Apostrophe, Personification: The poet addresses the west wind as if it were a person.
Metaphor: Comparison of the poet and the forest to a lyre, a stringed musical instrument (line 57).
Metaphor: Comparison of the poet to a forest (line 58).
Alliteration: The tumult of thy mighty harmonies (line 59).
Alliteration: Sweet though in sadness. Be thou, Spirit fierce, (line 61).
Metaphor: Comparison of the poet to the wind (line 62).
Alliteration: Drive my dead thoughts over the universe (line 63).
Simile: Comparison of thoughts to withered leaves (lines 63-64).
Alliteration: the incantation of this (line 65).
Simile: Comparison of words to ashes and sparks (66-67).
Alliteration: my words among mankind (67).
Metaphor: Comparison of the poet's voice to the wind as a trumpet of a prophecy (lines 68-69).
Alliteration: trumpet of a prophecy (lines 68-69).
Alliteration: O Wind, / If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?
.......
Structure and Rhyme Scheme
.......The poem contains five stanzas of fourteen lines each. Each stanza has three tercets and a closing couplet. In poetry, a tercet is a unit of three lines that usually contain end rhyme; a couplet is a two-line unit that usually contains end rhyme. Shelley wrote the tercets in a verse form called terza rima, invented by Dante Alighieri. In this format, line 2 of one tercet rhymes with lines 1 and 3 of the next tercet. In regard to the latter, consider the first three tercets of the second stanza of "Ode to the West Wind." Notice that shed (second line, first tercet) rhymes with spread and head (first and third lines, second tercet) and that surge (second line, second tercet) rhymes with verge and dirge (first and third lines, third tercet).
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 airy surge,
Like the bright hair uplifted from the head 20
Of some fierce Mænad, even from the dim verge
Of the horizon to the zenith's height,
The locks of the approaching storm. Thou dirge
.......All of the couplets in the poem rhyme, but the last couplet (lines 69-70) is an imperfect rhyme called eye rhyme. Eye rhyme occurs when the pronunciation of the last syllable of one line is different from the pronunciation of the last syllable of another line even though both syllables are identical in spelling except for a preceding consonant. For example, the following end-of-line word pairs would constitute eye rhyme: cough, rough; cow, mow; daughter, laughter; rummaging, raging. In Shelley's poem, wind and behind form eye rhyme.
.......Shelley unifies the content of the poem by focusing the first three stanzas on the powers of the wind and the last two stanzas on the poet's desire to use these powers to spread his words throughout the world.
Meter.......Most of the lines in the poem are in iambic pentameter, although some of the pentameter lines have an extra syllable (catalexis). The following tercet from the first stanza demonstrates the iambic-pentameter format, with the stressed syllables in capitals:
..........1................2..................3... ..............4.............5
The WING.|.èd SEEDS,.|.where THEY.|.lie COLD.|.and LOW,
..........1................2..............3....... .......4.............5
Each LIKE.|.a CORPSE.|.with IN.|.its GRAVE,.|.un TIL
.......1............2..........3..............4... ...............
:........1...............2.............3.......... ....4.............5............
And here is a line that does not follow the format. It is in iambic hexameter:..........1................2..................3.. ...............4.............5............6
Theme and Historical BackgroundIrresistible Power
.......The poet desires the irresistible power of the wind to scatter the words he has written about his ideals and causes, one of which was opposition to Britain’s monarchical government as a form of tyranny. Believing firmly in democracy and individual rights, he supported movements to reform government. In 1819, England’s nobility feared that working-class citizens—besieged by economic problems, including high food prices—would imitate the rebels of the French Revolution and attempt to overthrow the established order. On August 16, agitators attracted tens of thousands of people to a rally in St. Peter’s Field, Manchester, to urge parliamentary reform and to protest laws designed to inflate the cost of corn and wheat. Nervous public officials mismanaged the unarmed crowd and ended up killing 11 protesters and injuring more than 500 others. In reaction to this incident, Shelley wrote The Masque of Anarchy in the fall of 1819 to urge further nonviolent action against the government. This work was not published during his lifetime. However, "Ode to the West Wind," also written in the fall of 1819, was published a year later. The poem obliquely refers to his desire to spread his reformist ideas when it says, "Scatter, as from an unextinguish'd hearth / Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind!" Shelley believed that the poetry he wrote had the power bring about political reform: "Poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the World," he wrote in another work, A Defence of Poetry.
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