Ode to the West Wind

Shelley’s ‘Ode to the West Wind’ focuses on the necessary destruction for rebirth carried out by the personified mighty west wind.

Percy Bysshe Shelley

He was born in 1792 and died in 1822 at twenty-nine.

Key Poem Information

Central Message: The dual nature of the West Wind

Speaker: Someone who worships the wind.

Emotions Evoked: Excitement , Faith

Poetic Form: Ode

Time Period: 19th Century

Shelley deftly personifies the West Wind as a force of nature that holds the power to both destroy and renew in this poem.

Poem Analyzed by Allisa Corfman

Degree in Secondary Education/English and Teacher of World Literature and Composition

In this poem, ‘Ode to the West Wind,’ Percy Shelley creates a speaker who seems to worship the wind. He always refers to the wind as “Wind” using the capital letter, suggesting that he sees it as his god. He praises the wind, referring to its strength and might in tones similar to the Biblical Psalms, which worship God. He also refers to the Greek God Dionysus.

The speaker continues to praise the wind and to beseech it to hear him. When he is satisfied that the wind hears him, he begs the wind to take him away in death in hopes that there will be a new life waiting for him on the other side.

Ode to the West Wind Percy Bysshe Shelley 
IO wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn’s being,Thou, from whose unseen presence the leaves deadAre driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing,Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red,Pestilence-stricken multitudes: O thou,Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed
 
The wingèd seeds, where they lie cold and low,Each like a corpse within its grave, untilThine azure sister of the Spring shall blow
 
Her clarion o’er the dreaming earth, and fill(Driving sweet buds like flocks to feed in air)With living hues and odours plain and hill:
 
Wild Spirit, which art moving everywhere;Destroyer and Preserver; hear, O hear!
 
IIThou on whose stream, ‘mid the steep sky’s commotion,Loose clouds like Earth’s decaying leaves are shed,Shook from the tangled boughs of Heaven and Ocean,
 
Angels of rain and lightning: there are spreadOn the blue surface of thine airy surge,Like the bright hair uplifted from the head
 
Of some fierce Maenad, even from the dim vergeOf the horizon to the zenith’s height,The locks of the approaching storm. Thou dirge
 
Of the dying year, to which this closing nightWill be the dome of a vast sepulchreVaulted with all thy congregated might
 
Of vapours, from whose solid atmosphereBlack rain, and fire, and hail will burst: O hear!
 
IIIThou who didst waken from his summer dreamsThe blue Mediterranean, where he lay,Lulled by the coil of his crystalline streams,
 
Beside a pumice isle in Baiae’s bay,And saw in sleep old palaces and towersQuivering within the wave's intenser day,
 
All overgrown with azure moss and flowersSo sweet, the sense faints picturing them! ThouFor whose path the Atlantic’s level powers
 
Cleave themselves into chasms, while far belowThe sea-blooms and the oozy woods which wearThe sapless foliage of the ocean, knowThy voice, and suddenly grow grey with fear,And tremble and despoil themselves: O hear!
 
IVIf I were a dead leaf thou mightest bear;If I were a swift cloud to fly with thee;A wave to pant beneath thy power, and share
 
The impulse of thy strength, only less freeThan thou, O Uncontrollable! If evenI were as in my boyhood, and could be
 
The comrade of thy wanderings over Heaven,As then, when to outstrip thy skiey speedScarce seemed a vision; I would ne’er have striven
 
As thus with thee in prayer in my sore need.Oh! lift me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud!I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed!
 
A heavy weight of hours has chained and bowedOne too like thee: tameless, and swift, and proud.
 
VMake me thy lyre, even as the forest is:What if my leaves are falling like its own!The tumult of thy mighty harmonies
 
Will take from both a deep, autumnal tone,Sweet though in sadness. Be thou, Spirit fierce,My spirit! Be thou me, impetuous one!
 
Drive my dead thoughts over the universeLike withered leaves to quicken a new birth!And, by the incantation of this verse,
 
Scatter, as from an unextinguished hearthAshes and sparks, my words among mankind!Be through my lips to unawakened Earth
 
The trumpet of a prophecy! O Wind,If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?

Explore Ode to the West Wind

• 1 Summary
• 2 Themes
• 3 Structure and Form
• 4 Literary Devices
• 5 Analysis of Ode to the West Wind
• 6 FAQs
• 7 Similar Poetry

Summary

‘Ode to the West Wind’ by Percy Bysshe Shelley focuses on the west wind, a powerful and destructive force, yet a necessary one.

In the first lines, the speaker addresses the wind and describes how it creates deadly storms. It drives away the summer and brings with it the cold and darkness of winter. He imagines what it would be like to be a dead leaf lifted and blown around by the wind, and he implores the wind to lift him “as a wave, a lead, a cloud!” The speaker sees the wind as a necessary evil, one that eventually means that spring is on the way.

Themes

Shelley engages with themes of death, rebirth, and poetry in ‘Ode to the West Wind.’ From the start, Shelley’s speaker describes the wind as something powerful and destructive. It takes away the summer and brings winter, a season usually associated with death and sorrow. It’s not a peaceful wind, he adds, but despite this, the speaker celebrates it. It is necessary for the circle of life to progress.

Without death, there is no rebirth. The wind serves an important role in preserving this. Poetry is one of the less obvious themes in ‘Ode to the West Wind.’ The speaker seems to allude to a process of creation in the text that involves him personally. This might, considering the format, be the creation of poetry.

Structure and Form

‘Ode to the West Wind’ by Percy Bysshe Shelley is written in terza rima. This refers to an interlocking rhyme scheme. The first stanza is written in the pattern of ABA, while the second uses the same “B” rhyme sound and adds a “C.” So it looks like BCB.

This repeats throughout the text until the final two lines, which rhyme as a couplet. Despite the pattern, there are several half rhymes in this piece. For example, “everywhere” and “hear” in lines thirteen and fourteen.

The majority of ‘Ode to the West Wind’ is written in iambic pentameter. This means that most of the lines contain five sets of two beats. The first of which is unstressed, and the second is stressed. This pattern does change in some lines more than others. This is particularly evident in the first stanza, where all the lines are irregular.

Literary Devices

Shelley makes use of several literary devices in ‘Ode to the West Wind.’ These include alliteration, personification, and apostrophe. The latter is an interesting device that is used when the poet’s speaker talks to something or someone who either can’t hear them or can’t respond.

In this case, the speaker starts out the poem by talking to the “West Wind” as though it can do both. In addition to this, the poet also personifies the wind or gives it human abilities that forces or animals don’t naturally have.

Alliteration is a common type of repetition that appears when the poet repeats the same consonant sound at the beginning of words. For example, “lie” and “low” in line one of stanza three of canto one as well as “steep sky” in stanza one of canto two.

Enjambement is another common technique. It occurs several times in ‘Ode to the West Wind.’ For example, the transition between lines two and three of stanza one, canto one as well as lines two and three of stanza three, canto one.

Analysis of Ode to the West Wind

Canto 1

Stanza One

O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn’s being,
Thou, from whose unseen presence the leaves dead
Are driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing,

In the opening stanza of Ode to the West Wind, the speaker appeals to the wild West Wind. The use of capital letters for “West” and “Wind” immediately suggests that he is speaking to the Wind as though it were a person. He calls the wind the “breath of Autumn’s being”, thereby further personifying the wind and giving it the human quality of having breath.

He describes the wind as having “unseen presence,” which makes it seem as though he views the wind as a sort of god or spiritual being. The last line of this stanza specifically refers to the wind as a spiritual being that drives away death and ghosts.

Stanza Two

Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red,
Pestilence-stricken multitudes: O thou,
Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed

This stanza of Ode to the West Wind describes the dead Autumn leaves. They are not described as colorful and beautiful but rather as a symbol of death and even disease. The speaker describes the deathly colors “yellow” “black” and “pale.” Even “hectic red” reminds one of blood and sickness.

He describes the dead and dying leaves as “Pestilence stricken multitudes.” This is not a peaceful or beautiful description of the fall leaves. Rather, the speaker sees the fall leaves as a symbol of the dead, the sick, and the dying. The wind then comes along like a chariot and carries the leaves “to their dark wintry bed,” which is clearly a symbol of a grave.

Stanza Three

The wingèd seeds, where they lie cold and low,
Each like a corpse within its grave, until
Thine azure sister of the Spring shall blow

The speaker continues the metaphor of the leaves as the dead by explaining that the wind carries them and “winged seeds” to their graves, “where they lie cold and low.” He then uses a simile to compare each leaf to “a corpse within its grave.” But then, partway through the second line, a shift occurs.

The speaker says that each is like a corpse “until” the wind comes through, taking away the dead but bringing new life. The use of the word “azure” or blue to describe the wind sharply contrasts the colors used to describe the leaves.

Stanza Four

Her clarion o’er the dreaming earth, and fill
(Driving sweet buds like flocks to feed in air)
With living hues and odours plain and hill:

In this stanza of Ode to the West Wind, the speaker describes the wind as something that drives away death, buries the dead, and brings new life. It brings “living hues” and “ordours,” which are filled with new life.

Stanza Five

Wild Spirit, which art moving everywhere;
Destroyer and Preserver; hear, O hear!

Here, the speaker again appeals to the wind, calling it a “wild spirit” and viewing it as a spiritual being who destroys and preserves life. He is asking this spirit to hear his pleas. He has not yet made a specific request of the wind, but it is clear that he views it as a powerful spiritual being who can hear him.

Canto 2

Stanza One

Thou on whose stream, ‘mid the steep sky’s commotion,
Loose clouds like Earth’s decaying leaves are shed,
Shook from the tangled boughs of Heaven and Ocean,

Again, the speaker addresses the wind as a person, calling it the one who will “loose clouds” and shake the leaves of the “boughs of Heaven and Ocean.” This reads almost like a Psalm as if the speaker praises the wind for its power.

Stanza Two

Angels of rain and lightning: there are spread
On the blue surface of thine airy surge,
Like the bright hair uplifted from the head

Again, the speaker refers to the wind as a spiritual being more powerful than angels, for the angels “of rain and lightning” are described as being “spread on the blue surface” of the wind. He then describes these angels as being “like the bright hair” on the head of an even greater being.

Stanza Three

Of some fierce Maenad, even from the dim verge
Of the horizon to the zenith’s height,
The locks of the approaching storm. Thou dirge

In this stanza of Ode to the West Wind, the speaker compares the wind to a “fierce Maenad,” or the spiritual being that used to be found around the Greek God Dionysus. Remember, this is the being that was also described as having hair like angels. Thus, the wind is described as a being like a god with angels for hair. These angels of rain and lightning reveal that a storm is on the way.

Stanza Four

Of the dying year, to which this closing night
Will be the dome of a vast sepulchre
Vaulted with all thy congregated might

The speaker then explains that the storm approaching is the impending doom of the dying year. The use of ‘sepulcher’ is interesting, too, since this refers to a small room/monument in which a person is buried, typically of Christian origin.

To refer to something like this could suggest that Shelley wants to trap and contain all of the power of nature inside the tomb for it to ‘burst’ open in stanza 5. As well as this, a sepulcher is an isolating way of being buried, which could indicate Shelley wants to move away from all his miseries and be finally at one with nature.

Stanza Five

Of vapours, from whose solid atmosphere
Black rain, and fire, and hail will burst: O hear!

The speaker then describes the wind as the bringer of death. He has already described it as the Destroyer. Here, he describes it as one who brings “black rain and fire and hail..” Then, to end this Canto, the speaker again appeals to the wind, begging that it would hear him.

Canto 3

Stanza One

Thou who didst waken from his summer dreams
The blue Mediterranean, where he lay,
Lulled by the coil of his crystalline streams,

To begin this Canto, the speaker describes the wind as having woken up the Mediterranean Sea from a whole summer of peaceful rest. The sea, here, is also personified.

Stanza Two

Beside a pumice isle in Baiae’s bay,
And saw in sleep old palaces and towers
Quivering within the wave’s intenser day,

With this stanza of Ode to the West Wind, the speaker simply implies that the sea was dreaming of the old days of palaces and towers and that he was “quivering” at the memory of an “intenser day.”

Stanza Three

All overgrown with azure moss and flowers
So sweet, the sense faints picturing them! Thou
For whose path the Atlantic’s level powers

The speaker continues to describe the sea’s dreams as being of slower days when everything was overgrown with blue “moss and flowers.” Then, he hints that something is about to change when he mentions the Atlantic’s “powers.”

Stanzas Four and Five

Cleave themselves into chasms, while far below
The sea-blooms and the oozy woods which wear
The sapless foliage of the ocean, know

Thy voice, and suddenly grow grey with fear,
And tremble and despoil themselves: O hear!

This stanza of Ode to the West Wind is in reference to the sea’s reaction to the power of the wind. At the first sign of the strong wind, the sea seems to “cleave” into “chasms” and “grow grey with fear” as they tremble at the power of the wind. Again, this stanza reflects a Psalm in the worship of a God so mighty that nature itself trembles in its sight.

Canto 4

Stanza One

If I were a dead leaf thou mightest bear;
If I were a swift cloud to fly with thee;
A wave to pant beneath thy power, and share

Here, the speaker finally brings his attention to himself. He imagines that he is a dead leaf that the wind might carry away or a cloud that the wind might blow. He thinks about what it would be like to be a wave at the mercy of the power of the wind.

Stanza Two

The impulse of thy strength, only less free
Than thou, O Uncontrollable! If even
I were as in my boyhood, and could be

The speaker stands in awe of the wondrous strength of the wind. It seems to act on “impulse,” and its strength is “uncontrollable.” He then mentions his own childhood.

Stanza Three

The comrade of thy wanderings over Heaven,
As then, when to outstrip thy skiey speed
Scarce seemed a vision; I would ne’er have striven

Here, the speaker seems to wonder whether the wind has gotten stronger since his childhood or whether he has become weaker. He thinks that when he was a boy, he may have been about to “outstrip” the speed of the wind. And yet, his boyhood “seemed a vision” so distant and so long ago. The speaker is clearly contrasting the strength of the wind to his own weakness that has come upon him as he ages.

Stanza Four

As thus with thee in prayer in my sore need.
Oh! lift me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud!
I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed!

Here, the speaker finally comes to his request. Until now, he has been asking the wind to hear him, but he has not made any specific requests. Now, he compares himself to a man “in prayer in [his] sore need,” and he begs the wind to “lift [him] as a wave, a leaf, a cloud.” He longs to be at the mercy of the wind, whatever may come of it.

In the final line, he refers to himself as one who is in the final stages of his life when he says, “I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed”. Just like the wind swept away the dead leaves of Autumn, the speaker calls for the wind to sweep him away, old and decaying as he is.

Stanza Five

A heavy weight of hours has chained and bowed
One too like thee: tameless, and swift, and proud.

The speaker says that the weight of all of his years of life has bowed him down, even though he was once like the wind, “tameless…swift, and proud”.

Canto 5

Stanza One

Make me thy lyre, even as the forest is:
What if my leaves are falling like its own!
The tumult of thy mighty harmonies

Again, the speaker begs the wind to make him be at its mercy. He wants to be like a lyre (or harp) played by the wind. He wants to be like the dead leaves which fall to the ground when the wind blows.

Stanza Two

Will take from both a deep, autumnal tone,
Sweet though in sadness. Be thou, Spirit fierce,
My spirit! Be thou me, impetuous one!

In this stanza of Ode to the West Wind, the speaker asks the wind to come into him and make him alive. This is yet another reference to the wind as a sort of god. In some religions, particularly the Christian religion, there is the belief that to have a new life, one must receive the Holy Spirit into his bodily being.

This is precisely what the speaker is asking the wind to do to him. He realizes that for this to happen, his old self would be swept away. That is why he describes this as “sweet though in sadness.” But he asks the spirit of the wind to be his own spirit and to be one with him.

Stanza Three

Drive my dead thoughts over the universe
Like withered leaves to quicken a new birth!
And, by the incantation of this verse,

The speaker asks the wind to “drive [his] dead thoughts over the universe” so that even as he dies, others might take his thoughts and his ideas and give them “new birth.” He thinks this might even happen with the words he is speaking now.

Stanza Four

Scatter, as from an unextinguished hearth
Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind!
Be through my lips to unawakened Earth

The speaker asks the wind to scatter his thoughts as “ashes and sparks” so that his words might kindle a fire among mankind and perhaps awaken the sleeping earth.

Stanza Five

The trumpet of a prophecy! O Wind,
If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?

The speaker has used spiritual and biblical references throughout Ode to the West Wind to personify the wind as a god, but here, he makes it a little more specific. When he says, “The trumpet of prophecy,” he specifically refers to the end of the world as the Bible describes it. When the trumpet of prophecy is blown, Christ is believed to return to earth to judge the inhabitants. The speaker asks the Wind to blow that trumpet.

Because of the speaker’s tone throughout ‘Ode to the West Wind,’ it would make sense if this was the speaker’s own personal trumpet, marking the end of his life. He wants the wind to blow this trumpet. In the last two lines of Ode to the West Wind, the speaker reveals why he has begged the wind to take him away in death. He says, “If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?”

This reveals his hope that there is an afterlife for him. He desperately hopes that he might leave behind his dying body and enter into a new life after his death.

FAQs

The tone of the poem varies, shifting from despair and longing to inspiration and hope. This range of emotions adds depth to the poem and allows it to capture the complexities of human experience.

This poem is a significant contribution to 19th-century English poetry. It embodies many of the era’s key themes. These include the interplay between man and nature and the quest for personal and societal transformation.

The poem ends on an optimistic note, suggesting that if winter (decay and end) is coming, then spring (renewal and beginning) cannot be far behind. This reflects the cyclical view of life that is central to the poem.

This piece is considered a significant work for multiple reasons, both within the scope of Percy Bysshe Shelley’s oeuvre and in the broader landscape of English literature. For instance, it’s a prime example of Romantic poetry. It encapsulates key themes of the movement, like the awe-inspiring power of nature, individual emotional experience, and the yearning for transformation.

Similar Poetry

Readers who enjoyed ‘Ode to the West Wind’ should also consider reading some of Shelley’s other poems. For example:

• ‘Adonais‘ – Shelley writes a tribute to fellow poet John Keats, who died at age twenty-five.
• ‘Ozymandias‘ – is a very memorable poem that’s often studied in schools worldwide. It describes a long-abandoned and broken statue in the desert, looking out over a domain that no longer exists.
• ‘Mutability‘ – Shelley takes everyday elements of life, from wind to the sky and emotions, and compares them to human nature and the facts of life.
  

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Ode to the West Wind

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