A summer wind rushes through a meadow, shaking wildflowers, bending reedy grass, and setting everything into motion. The speaker is caught up in this lively scene—butterflies skitter like tiny boats, bees buzz about in confusion, rushes whistle, and the very grass seems to hum. It’s all “stir and strife and life and bustle,” and he feels the energy of the season as a kind of joyful restlessness. Then the poem turns intimate: he asks a “bonny lass” to be his, drawn by her floating garment in the same wind. He wants to walk with her, stand beneath a willow, and watch a reeling bee tossed like a little boat on a grassy sea—while they exchange vows of love. The wind becomes a shared, tender force that links the natural world’s exuberance to their own budding affection. The mood is airy, romantic, and full of the breathless, happy motion of a summer’s day.
Summer Winds — Summary
The wind waves oer the meadows green And shakes my own wild flowers And shifts about the moving scene Like the life of summer hours; The little bents with reedy head, The scarce seen shapes of flowers, All kink about like skeins of thread In these wind-shaken hours.
All stir and strife and life and bustle In everything around one sees; The rushes whistle, sedges rustle, The grass is buzzing round like bees; The butterflies are tossed about Like skiffs upon a stormy sea; The bees are lost amid the rout And drop in [their] perplexity.
Wilt thou be mine, thou bonny lass? Thy drapery floats so gracefully; We'll walk along the meadow grass, We'll stand beneath the willow tree. We'll mark the little reeling bee Along the grassy ocean rove, Tossed like a little boat at sea, And interchange our vows of love.