FREE ESSAY ON POETIC INSPIRATION

POETIC INSPIRATION

Poetic Inspiration
In Keat's Ode to a Nightingale and Shelley's Ode to the West Wind both poet's show much
inspiration within their poetry. The bird in Ode to a Nightingale represents a
supernatural being conjured up by the speaker. The wind in Ode to the West Wind inspires
the speaker while serving as a destroyer and preserver. 
In the poem, Ode to a Nightingale the reader sees that the poet draws his inspiration
through hemlock which the poet had drunk and some kind of opiate. The poet speaks about
dying from the consumption of some type of poisonous drink in stanza two. The speaker
wants to, Fade far away, dissolve, and quite forget / What thou among the leaves has
never known (21-22). He doesn't seem to have much respect for or admiration of the world.
The speaker cites all of the bad aspects of life and the world which inspire him to
contemplate suicide. This idea of death and suicide is further displayed through the
quote in stanza six :
 I have been half in love with easeful Death,
...Now more than ever seems it rich to die,
To cease upon the midnight with no pain,
While thou art pouring forth thy soul abroad
In such an ecstasy (52-58).
The reader's contemplation of suicide is thoroughly depicted through this quote. The
reader is actually thinking these thoughts because he realizes that the beautiful bird's
songs only occur through death because the bird is immortal and with the immortal bird
comes the immortal song. He shows his admiration for the bird when he speaks of the
bird's past experiences. He is greatly inspired by the bird and this is the reason for
this poem, but in the last stanza he returns to reality and back to his sole self. He no
longer wants to die and hear this immortal song sung by the bird which he once longed to
experience. 
In 'Ode to the West Wind', the reader sees yet another poet inspired by something that
has caught the speaker's attention.