Hello and welcome to the Discourse. ‘My Heart Leaps Up’ is a short lyrical poem by William Wordsworth in 1802. According to his sister Dorothy’s diary entry, William Wordsworth composed the poem on March 26, 1802, while living at Dove Cottage in the scenic Lake District of northern England. However, the poem was first published in 1807 in his poetic collection ‘Poems: in Two Volumes’. Wordsworth and his friend Samuel Taylor Coleridge were working together for the publication of the third edition of Lyrical Ballads which was meant to oppose the priggish, learned, and highly sculpted forms of 18th-century English poetry and to make poetry accessible to the average person via verse written in common, everyday language. ‘My Heart Leaps Up’ is a prime example of this effort because the vocabulary and meaning of this poem are pretty easy to grasp. The major theme of the poem is to signify the importance of childhood feelings and suggests that one should try to keep their childlike nature alive while aging. The most quoted line of the poem is ‘The Child is father of Man.’
Another important theme of the poem is Love for nature, the natural life cycle, and purity in nature.
Structure of ‘My Heart Leaps Up’:
It is a short poem consisting of only nine lines that do not follow any particular poetic form. While there is only one stanza, these nine lines can be divided into three sections. In the first two lines, the speaker mentions how wonderful and joyful he felt when he glimpsed a rainbow. In the next four lines (3-6), he mentions that he has felt the same since childhood and throughout adulthood and wishes to feel the same till his death. In the final three lines, the speaker expresses his philosophical note on the feelings in the lines above. The poet followed iambic tetrameter throughout the poem, however, in line 2, he used iambic trimeter, and line 6 is composed in iambic dimeter. The rhyming scheme of the poem is ABCCABCDD, however, one may say it is written in free verse.
Consonance, Assonance, Personification, Paradox, Allusion, Enjambment, Hyperbole, Imagery, and Symbolism are used in the poem.
Summary of ‘My Heart Leaps Up’:
Lines 1-2
“My heart leaps up when I behold
A rainbow in the sky:”
Wordsworth is often considered as a nature poet. His deep love towards nature is well expressed in his various poems and this poem follows the same pattern. In the first two lines, the speaker mentions his deep affinity towards nature as he glimpses a rainbow in the sky. Rainbows are, universally, regarded as beautiful, but the rainbow in this poem is a symbol of nature as a whole. The speaker says ‘My heart leaps up’...which suggests that it is an extreme reaction. Almost everyone likes to see a rainbow, but adults generally do not feel such excitement while seeing a rainbow. However, as the poem progresses, the speaker suggests that everyone should be similarly excited like a child while witnessing the wonders of nature.
The poet used Symbolism in Line 2. The rainbow is used as a symbol of hope. Rainbows are beautiful sights that show up after storms. As such, they signify the passing of a storm—symbolically, of turmoil and suffering—and the start of a calmer, lovelier period. The rainbow may also allude (Allusion) to the story of Noah in the Book of Genesis, in which God sends a rainbow as a promise to never again destroy the earth with floods. The heart of the speaker fills up with the same sense of hope and promise.
Lines 3-4
“So was it when my life began;
So is it now I am a man;”
In these lines, the speaker mentions that he felt a similar joy, and sense of wonder-struck when he saw a rainbow as a child, and he feels the same now when he is an adult. The speaker expresses that his admiration for nature began right from his childhood and persisted through his adulthood.
The poet began lines 3 and 4 with ‘So’ using Anaphora to emphasize that aging has not reduced his admiration for nature. Consonance has also been used in line 3 (sound of /w/).
Lines 5-6
“So be it when I shall grow old,
Or let me die!”
The poet used Hyperbole in these lines. The speaker says that he wishes to grow old with the same reverence, awe, and love for nature that he has maintained since his childhood. Otherwise, he will prefer to die (Or let me die!). The sixth line shows the strength of the speaker's convictions. The speaker suggests that he would rather prefer death than live a boring life bereft of beauty, unable to grasp the wonder of nature.
Line 7
“The Child is father of Man;”
This is the most popular, deep, and intriguing line of the poem. The poet used Paradox in this line. Readers can have different interpretations of the line. The simplest and logical understanding of this line is that wonder, awe, and respect towards nature, along with many other values such as sincerity, honesty, enthusiasm and respect for others are characteristics of a child, and these characteristics shape the growing child into the man he becomes. The experiences of a child make him a man and hence, the child is a father of a man. The speaker stresses that for an ever-evolving individual, one should maintain these childlike characteristics, at least, the speaker suggests that one should maintain, the wonder and respect towards nature that one feels as a child, throughout their life.
Another interpretation of the same line can be that for a parent, a child can be a great teacher and a role model from whom the adult parent may learn to respect and admire nature and other little wonders of life.
Lines 8-9
“And I could wish my days to be
Bound each to each by natural piety.”
The poet ends the poem by stressing the importance of childhood and how strongly he desires to maintain its characteristics throughout his life.
The importance of childlike attributes was also explained in Tintern Abbey in which the speaker suggested that children are closer to heaven and God, and through God, nature, because they have recently come from the arms of God. The speaker expresses the importance of staying connected to one's own childhood. Wordsworth was a naturalist who believed nature is divine and thus, he uses the phrase ‘natural piety’ that children often enjoy and that the speaker wishes to enjoy throughout his life.
So this is it for today. We will continue to discuss the history of English literature. Please stay connected with the Discourse. Thanks and Regards!
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