Daffodils

The speaker in “Daffodils” recalls feeling mentally isolated, a fact made clear by the poem’s first line and original title, “I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud.” However, the speaker’s encounter with the field of flowers reminds them that there is beauty in the natural world, and they are a part of it, despite their occasional thoughts of separation and/or despondency. This, in turn, causes moments of joy for the speaker when the daffodils are recollected in the future.

As the poem begins in the past tense, the speaker remembers themselves as “lonely as a cloud” (Line 1). They perceive their status at the time as aimless and disconnected, as they “wandered” (Line 1) and “float[ed]” (Line 2) above the world. There is a level of disengagement or superiority with the world below. However, after they perused the “vales and hills” (Line 2), which may perhaps symbolize the highs and lows of life, the speaker discovered a happy surprise—a patch of flowers that filled them with awe.

“Beside the lake, beneath the trees” (Line 5), they spied some “golden daffodils” (Line 4). While the speaker recalls the bright color of the flowers, they also remember being drawn to the fact that they were not solitary. They appeared as “a crowd, / a host” (Lines 3-4). The speaker was fascinated by the amount of blooms. This in turn heightened the speaker’s sense of being alone, which isn’t described as a peaceful solitude, but “lonely” (Line 1). The daffodils, by contrast, “stretched in never-ending line” (Line 9). The epic quality of their multitude gives way to the speaker’s exaggeration. They recount the flowers as being “continuous as the stars that shine / And twinkle on the milky way” (Lines 7-8). Besides implying imagery of color—yellow dots amongst a dark background—these lines also suggest abundance, which is confirmed by the successive usage of the hyperbolic “ten thousand” (Line 11). While this can hardly be an accurate amount, it does convey the immensity of the number of blooms.

The speaker next emphasizes that the daffodils conveyed joy. Initially, in the memory, the flowers are merely observed as happy themselves; later, in the final stanza during the present, they inspire the speaker’s own feelings of cheerfulness. They “fluttered and danced in the breeze” (Line 6), “tossed their heads” (Line 12), and moved “sprightly” (Line 12). The speaker saw them as “glee[ful]” (Line 14) and “jocund” (Line 16). Further, their sense of pleasure was contagious, and the speaker could not resist feeling happy “[i]n such […] company” (Line 16). The speaker, who began the memory disconnected from nature and surveying everything from a distance, now finds themselves “company” (Line 16) among the flowers blooming on the ground. This is not only a visual contrast of imagery but also an indication of a mental shift, highlighting an important connection that developed between the speaker and nature. Though this is a moment of important emotional change for the speaker, they did not realize it at the time, paying the flowers “little thought” (Line 17) and thinking of them as pretty, temporary, objects.

However, as the poem closes and returns to the speaker’s present, they admit to “oft[en]” revisiting the scene mentally. This occurs particularly when the speaker is again alone. The speaker discovers that when they lie on their couch “[i]n vacant or in pensive mood” (Line 20), the daffodils rise in their imagination. This generally happens when the speaker’s emotional state is similar to the “lonely” (Line 1) feeling from the memory that opened the poem. Now, when they “wande[r]” (Line 1) mentally, they can become disconnected, but the memory of the flowers brings them back to the joys of earthly company. When the daffodils “flash upon the inward eye” (Line 21), they remind the speaker of something greater than themselves. The memory of the “jocund company” (Line 16) that can be found in nature frees them from potentially negative isolation.

This is clarified in the last two lines, when the speaker’s “heart with pleasure fills / and dances with the daffodils” (Lines 23-24). This is the “wealth” (Line 18) brought by the experience of awe in nature.