There Was Set Before Me a Mighty Hill

There Was Set Before Me a Mighty Hill - meaning Summary

Striving Yields Distant Vision

The short poem presents a speaker who climbs a steep, snowbound hill and expects a transformative summit. After long effort the promised view reveals distant gardens rather than immediate reward. The image compresses a mood of striving and anticlimax: the journey yields vision but not possession. It emphasizes distance and perspective, suggesting that goals often reconfigure what we see rather than deliver what we hoped to gain.