The speaker begins by craving wide open sky and high hills, far above houses, hedgerows, and sheep. He wants a vantage point where nothing blocks the eye, only buzzards overhead. This craving sharpens into a disgust for the woods and hedge-trees around him. He compares them to weeds on the floor of a vast, deep river of air, and himself to a tench—a bottom-feeding fish—living in weeds and mud, never truly looking up. He acknowledges that even a tench occasionally rises among lily leaves and glimpses the sky, or feels no grief if it sees nothing; but he, stuck on the Wealden clay, feels trapped. The knowledge that trees are just weeds and fields are mud under that lofty sky feeds his restlessness. The poem ends with a quiet, near-biblical determination: he would arise and go far, to where the lilies are—a place of openness, calm, and clearer vision.
The Lofty Sky — Summary
TO-DAY I want the sky, The tops of the high hills, Above the last man's house, His hedges, and his cows, Where, if I will, I look Down even on sheep and rook, And of all things that move See buzzards only above:-- Past all trees, past furze And thorn, where nought deters The desire of the eye For sky, nothing but sky. I sicken of the woods And all the multitudes Of hedge-trees. They are no more Than weeds upon this floor Of the river of air Leagues deep, leagues wide, where I am like a fish that lives In weeds and mud and gives What's above him no thought. I might be a tench for aught That I can do to-day Down on the wealden clay. Even the tench has days When he floats up and plays Among the lily leaves And sees the sky, or grieves Not if he nothing sees: While I, I know that trees Under that lofty sky Are weeds, fields mud, and I Would arise and go far To where the lilies are.