XXVI
RETURN, Content! for fondly I
pursued,
Even when a child, the
Streams--unheard, unseen;
Through tangled woods, impending
rocks between;
Or, free as air, with flying inquest
viewed
The sullen reservoirs whence their
bold brood--
Pure as the morning, fretful,
boisterous, keen,
Green as the salt-sea billows, white
and green--
Poured down the hills, a choral
multitude!
Nor have I tracked their course for
scanty gains;
They taught me random cares and
truant joys, 10
That shield from mischief and
preserve from stains
Vague minds, while men are growing
out of boys;
Maturer Fancy owes to their
rough noise
Impetuous thoughts that brook not
servile reins.
Wordsworth
returns, after his dalliance with ‘soft ease’ to again follow the river. The
sonnet is a return too, from a fanciful interlude, to well-trodden
Wordsworthian territory – ‘Child is the Father of the Man’ ‘Fair Springtime had
my Soul’ et al.
….for fondly I pursued,
Even when a child, the
Streams--unheard, unseen;
Through tangled woods, impending
rocks between;
Or, free as air, with flying inquest
viewed
The sullen reservoirs whence their
bold brood--
Pure as the morning,
fretful, boisterous, keen,
Green as the salt-sea billows, white
and green--
Poured down the hills, a choral
multitude!
YES!!!!
The contrast between this sonnet and
the previous one emphasises the ‘poly-vocal’ nature of the series, the switches
of mode, variations in diction, the adoption of differing voices is
fascinating, or infuriating, depending, I suppose on judgements about what
constitutes Wordsworth’s core qualities as a poet. If you take the view that
the ideas on poetic diction found in the Lyrical Ballad’s Preface is some kind
of Wordworthian manifesto, then, much of his work will fail to meet his
professed criteria– but does that necessarily mean it is ‘sub-standard’ more
generally, or simply different?
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