2017

"I WANDERED LONELY AS A CLOUD"

William Wordsworth

  I WANDERED lonely as a cloud
  That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
  When all at once I saw a crowd,
  A host, of golden daffodils;
  Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
  Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

  Continuous as the stars that shine
  And twinkle on the milky way,
  They stretched in never-ending line
  Along the margin of a bay:                                  10
   Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
  Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

  The waves beside them danced; but they
  Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:
  A poet could not but be gay,
  In such a jocund company:
  I gazed--and gazed--but little thought
  What wealth the show to me had brought:

  For oft, when on my couch I lie
  In vacant or in pensive mood,                               20
  They flash upon that inward eye
  Which is the bliss of solitude;
  And then my heart with pleasure fills,
  And dances with the daffodils.

1. What is the speaker’s

mood

at the

beginning of the poem?

2. As the

speaker

wanders, what does he see

“all at once”?

3. How does the speaker’s

mood

change that

day because of what he sees?

4. How does the memory of what he saw
affect him later?

5. What

simile

does the speaker use to

describe his loneliness?

6. Which words in the poem

personify

the

daffodils, or make them seem like people—
even friends and companions—to the lonely
speaker?

Comments:

English Poetry Packet

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