To Autumn

John Keats

1.

SEASON of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run;
To bend with apples the moss’d cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For Summer has o’er-brimm’d their clammy cells.

2.

Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reap’d furrow sound asleep,
Drows’d with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers:
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cyder-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings hours by hours.

3.

Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,—
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
And touch the stubble plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.

2. How many kinds of imagery do you find in the poem? Give examples of each.

3. Are the images arranged haphazardly or are they carefully organized?

I think the poem was carefully organized. The first stanza kicks off the personification of autumn. The idea of "fruitfulness" that is first formed in stanza one carries on into the second stanza, but this stanza sees the beginning of the harvest, as evident by the mention of a granary and "a half-reaped furrow" (16). These first two stanzas are the process of maturing and aging, and the last stanza, one full of song. This last stanza alleviates the unspoken fears people have concerning their personal autum, comforting the reader by reminding them that the song of their spring has only been replaced by a new one.

4. What is autumn personified as in stanza 2? Is there and suggestion of personification in the other two stanzas?

Autumn is personified as a woman in stanza two. Personification is first used in the first stanza:

"SEASON of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run" (1-4)

5. Although the poem is primarily descriptive, what attitude toward transience and passing beauty is implicit in it?

It's okay to get old.