"Daffodils"

I'm ready for Spring, and I'm fairly sure it is just around the corner. In honor of that, an oldie, but goodie, if you will:

Daffodils

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:

Ten thousand saw I at a glance,

Tossing their heads in a sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but they

Outdid the sparkling waves in glee:

A poet could not but be gay,

In a 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,

They flash upon that inward eye

Which is the bliss of solitude;

And then my heart with pleasure fills,

And dances with the daffodils.

--William Wordsworth

I never really thought much of this poem until a few years ago. I was living in England, and it had been a long, very cold, very wet, extremely gray winter. By March, I was afraid I was going to rust, and I prayed everyday for Spring. One day in late March, as I walking, I came upon a park, and it was COVERED in daffodils; they had bloomed more or less overnight (I didn't know how suddenly Spring came on in England). I have never in my life been more happy to see a flower! The bright color after months of grey really lifted my spirits and I immediately thought of this poem; I realized perhaps what Wordsworth felt when he wrote this. This is why I love language so much: it can express the things we feel in our hearts, and allow other people a glimpse in. This poem really does evoke beautiful images, and every time I read it, I see, with my "inward eye", that park in England...