He Tells of a Valley Full of Lovers
He Tells of a Valley Full of Lovers - meaning Summary
Grief and Consuming Memory
The speaker dreams of standing apart in a valley as couples pass by, then sees his lost love appear with pale, dreamlike eyes. He reacts by pleading with women to shelter young men from temptation, warning that memory of one idealized face will make all others seem diminished. The poem presents longing as corrosive: private remembrance distorts perception and threatens to drain beauty from the wider world.
Read Complete AnalysesI dreamed that I stood in a valley, and amid sighs, For happy lovers passed two by two where I stood; And I dreamed my lost love came stealthily out of the wood With her cloud-pale eyelids falling on dream-dimmed eyes: I cried in my dream, O women, bid the young men lay Their heads on your knees, and drown their eyes with your hair, Or remembering hers they will find no other face fair Till all the valleys of the world have been withered away.
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