Ode: Intimations of Immortality from Early Childhood

There was a time when meadow, grove, and stream, The earth, and every common sight, To me did seem Apparell’d in celestial light, The glory and the freshness of a dream.

It is not now as it hath been of yore; Turn wheresoe’er I may, By night or day, The things which I have seen I now can see no more.

The rainbow comes and goes, And lovely is the rose; The clouds that overcast The sky are spread, on high, Like shadows of the past.

But I still feel your presence in the air, A lingering fragrance with each passing hour; Oh Nature, I seek you everywhere, In every field, by every flower.

There is a remembrance that words cannot claim, The gentle whisper of goodbyes, the untamed flame. Old friends are here with me, once more, Nature lives on, forever adored.

• William Wordsworth