1. What do the following phrases mean to you? Discuss in class.

(i) Humid shadows

(ii) Starry spheres

(iii) What a bliss

(iv) A thousand dreamy fancies into busy being start

(v) A thousand recollections weave their air-threads into woof

2. What does the poet like to do when it rains?

3. What is the single major memory that comes to the poet? Who are the “darling dreamers” he refers to?

4. Is the poet now a child? Is his mother still alive?

1. (i) “Humid shadows” refer to the dark clouds that produce rain.

(ii) “Starry spheres” refer to the night sky abounding in stars.

(iii) The phrase “what a bliss” refers to an extremely happy and heavenly feeling.

(iv)This refers to the various imaginary thoughts and fantasies that are aroused in the poet’s mind.

(v) This phrase means that numerous memories intermingle to form a beautiful picture that the poet recollects.

2. When it rains, the poet feels delighted to lie with his head pressed against the pillow of his cottage chamber bed and listen to the patter of the soft rain.

3. The single major memory that comes to the poet is that of his mother and her fond look.

The “darling dreamers” are the poet and his siblings in their childhood when they were lovingly put to sleep by their mother.

4. No, the poet is not a child now.

The fact that the poet recollects with fondness his mother's memories connote her absence. However, it is difficult to state whether she is dead or she is merely not staying with the poet any longer.