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About this quote

What does it mean?
Nature's harsh sounds and barren landscapes are called upon to mourn the wrongs done to the world.
In plain terms
Sad natural elements echo the suffering and injustice of the world.
What can you take from it?
External grief often mirrors internal or societal pain.

Where it applies

  • protest
  • artistic expression
  • mourning

Putting it to work

  • poetry
  • music
  • activism

Questions to consider

  • What does the wind wail about?
  • How do you express sadness?

Another view

The poem links nature's sound to human wrongs without explaining the connection.

More from Percy Bysshe Shelley

  1. A Sensitive Plant in a garden grew, And the young winds fed it with silver dew, And it opened its fan-like leaves to the light. And closed them beneath the kis…

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  2. Music, when soft voices die, Vibrates in the memory - Odours, when sweet violets sicken, Live within the sense they quicken. Rose leaves, when the rose is dead…

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  3. Though we eat little flesh and drink no wine, Yet let's be merry: we'll have tea and toast; Custards for supper, and an endless host Of syllabubs and jellies a…

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