nes, we learn that the memory is not of the two of them together, but primarily of his sister, Emmeline, who “feared to brush the dust from off its wings.” The memory seems like it should be a happy one, but the language of the beginning of the poem tells us otherwise, and we are left wondering what has happened between the memory and now.The tone of the second poem, the “April” poem, is quite different from that of the first. Here, the poet does not impose his own thoughts and impressions upon the butterfly, but simply observes it, and wonders about the natural life of a butterfly. He thinks of what it would be like to be a butterfly, thoughts that would put one in a fanciful mood, not a somber one. If the butterfly happened to take flight in the April poem, I think the poet would be happy about this (compare lines 7-9 of the April poem to lines 1-2 of the March poem). The next stanza is very important in differentiating between the uneasy sort of reflective mood of the March poem, because it describes the orchard-ground as theirs, his and his sister’s together, showing us that nothing bad has happened to her (an idea I got from the March poem). He tells the butterfly that it is welcome in their orchard whenever it would like to rest, and they would like to see him often. Lines 16-19 describe the conversations they will have (before, in the March poem, the conversation he finds in the butterfly brings a “solemn image” to his heart), how they will remember “sweet childish days, that were as long as twenty days are now.” There is no hint of the previous ominous tone of the March poem, only a sort of joyful memory of days gone by.The reason I chose to quote Wordsworth in the beginning of my paper is because I believe the memory that the sight of a butterfly brought on affected him deeply, and his first response emotionally was of wishing for days gone by, in a longing that coul...
