I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.
Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.
The waves beside them danced; but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company: I
gazed--and gazed--but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:
For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.

-William Wordsworth-

Warmth! So much that it makes me smile. 730pm and I sit on the beach almost too toasty to remain in my thin blue cardigan. I mixed teas today (revolutionary, i know). I drink mango ceylon/ tangerine orange iced tea. i am at peace right now-on the sand, leaning against a fish-hook shaped log as the sun clothes my face and illuminates a path from the distant sea to me. A bell begins to ding and the sudden rumbling of machinery behind me lets me know that the train is passing. A man sits on a log to my right facing south. He talks on his cellphone about websites. I want him to take off his shoes and remember what it feels like to have sandy toes and sun on his face. Eleven young teenage girls, a volleyball team it appears, barefooted, skip rocks and talk loudly about boys, a sort of performance for those sitting on the sand. ( 5 minutes have now passed and two of the eleven girls request i take there picture and i become glad that i am an approachable beach sitter :) ). Have been eavesdropping on cellphone-website-man and have learned he coaches baseball...i still want him to remove his shoes. I like my tea. I like sun and writing and smelling and having dirty feet and chipped nails. Have been reading William and Dorothy Wordsworth's work among other central Romantic poets. I've always fancied myself a Romantic in the modern sense of the word and am now pleased to know that I indeed fit into the Romantic genre in a literal and literary sense. The sun drops and the breeze grows. The water is increasingly silver. I once read of water described as liquid silver in some required high school text. It's funny what sticks with a person. 100 books and recall liquid silver. A seagull glides his way to shore and his bobbly mannerisms make me giggle. Are the birds happy too when the sun reappears in spring? Wordsworth believed in experiencing God in nature. His poetry is of daffodils and woods, milky skies and starry waters, the power of a rainbow to make the heart leap....his poetry is faith in that state of youth which knows no restrictions in passion for life, God, nature, love, , it is breathing, living, poetry. He watched his relationship with nature and God through 80 years and he despaired during the Victorian age with the rise of industrialism. Is this why it makes me sad to hear a man on his cellphone tonight? Cold now, sun almost under the water. It was healing here tonight.

My Heart Leaps Up
My heart leaps up when I behold
A rainbow in the sky:
So was it when my life began,
So is it now I am a man,
So be it when I shall grow old
Or let me die!
The child is father of the man:
And I could wish my days to be
Bound each to each by natural piety

-William Wordsworth-