“A Slumber Did My Spirit Seal” Introduction

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“A Slumber Did My Spirit Seal” Summary

“A Slumber Did My Spirit Seal” Themes

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  Grief and Mortality

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Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis of “A Slumber Did My Spirit Seal”

• Lines 1-2

  A slumber did my spirit seal;
  I had no human fears:

  

  

  

  

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• Lines 3-4

  She seemed a thing that could not feel
  The touch of earthly years.

  

  

  

  

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• Lines 5-6

  No motion has she now, no force;
  She neither hears nor sees;

  

  

  

  

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• Lines 7-8

  Rolled round in earth's diurnal course,
  With rocks, and stones, and trees.

  

  

  

  

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“A Slumber Did My Spirit Seal” Symbols

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  Rocks and Stones and Trees

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  Sleep

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“A Slumber Did My Spirit Seal” Poetic Devices & Figurative Language

• Alliteration

  

  

  

  

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• Assonance

  

  

  

  

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• Caesura

  

  

  

  

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• End-Stopped Line

  

  

  

  

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• Polysyndeton

  

  

  

  

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• Repetition

  

  

  

  

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• Metaphor

  

  

  

  

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“A Slumber Did My Spirit Seal” Vocabulary

Select any word below to get its definition in the context of the poem. The words are listed in the order in which they appear in the poem.

• Slumber
• Seal
• Earth's Diurnal Course

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Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme of “A Slumber Did My Spirit Seal”

• Form

• Meter

• Rhyme Scheme

“A Slumber Did My Spirit Seal” Speaker

“A Slumber Did My Spirit Seal” Setting

Literary and Historical Context of “A Slumber Did My Spirit Seal”

More “A Slumber Did My Spirit Seal” Resources

• External Resources

  • The Poem Aloud — Listen to the poem read out loud.

  • The Wordsworth Trust — Visit the Wordsworth Trust's website for more on Wordsworth's life, poetry, and legacy.

  • More on the Lyrical Ballads — Read about the second edition of Lyrical Ballads—the important collection in which this poem was first published—on the British Library's website.

  • A Short Biography — Read a brief biography of Wordsworth from the Poetry Foundation, where you can find links to more of his poems.

  • The Lucy Poems — Read a New Yorker essay that discusses what's so strange, novel, and important about Wordsworth's "Lucy poems."

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