“To Wordworth” by Percy Bysshe Shelley: An Elegy to Wordsworth(‘s Talents?)

Shelley and Wordsworth were contemporaries, and Wordsworth was quite alive and still writing at the time “To Wordsworth,” an elegy, was composed. Knowing this, I read and reread the poem with a critical eye, expecting to find some sort of sarcasm in Shelley’s words. The poem begins by invoking Wordsworth as “Poet of Nature,” (1) and continuing in the same Wordsworthian vein, talks about the poet’s subject matters – “Childhood and youth, friendship and love’s first glow,/. . . [fleeing] like sweet dreams,” (3-4).  These sentimental images are followed by the abrupt, short sentence, “These common woes I feel,” the word “common” implying that the speaker (Shelley) views the things which Wordsworth held as important as nondescript (5). The sentence’s tone is, overall, dismissive. The “loss” (5) which Shelley mentions (which he “deplores” and Wordsworth only “feels” (6), refers to Wordsworth “Deserting” (13)his writing of “Songs consecrate to truth and liberty” (12). Basically, Shelley is saying that Wordsworth has lost his touch, and what’s worse, he’s sadder about it than Wordsworth (or anybody else) is. As indicated by the title of this post, the elegy “To Wordsworth” could aptly be called “To Wordsworth’s Talent.”