Shelley addresses fellow poets with a strange, vivid comparison: chameleons live on light and air, poets on love and fame. If poets could get that nourishment as effortlessly, would they still change their colors twenty times a day to match every passing influence? The image turns darker when he imagines poets hidden in a sea-cave, shifting not with light but with the absence of love. Fame, he says, is only love in disguise—both are scarce, so poets’ restless “ranging” is hardly surprising. But then the poem stiffens into a warning. A poet’s mind is free and heavenly; to stain it with wealth or power would drag it down. If brilliant chameleons ate anything earthly, they’d become ordinary lizards. In the same way, poets—children of a sunnier star—should refuse such boons. The mood is tender and fierce: sympathy for the poet’s lot, but an almost protective zeal for keeping the poetic spirit unworldly.
An Exhortation — Summary
Chameleons feed on light and air: Poets' food is love and fame: If in this wide world of care Poets could but find the same With as little toil as they, Would they ever change their hue As the light chameleons do, Suiting it to every ray Twenty times a day?
Poets are on this cold earth, As chameleons might be, Hidden from their early birth in a cave beneath the sea; Where light is, chameleons change: Where love is not, poets do: Fame is love disguised: if few Find either, never think it strange That poets range.
Yet dare not stain with wealth or power A poet's free and heavenly mind: If bright chameleons should devour Any food but beams and wind, They would grow as earthly soon As their brother lizards are. Children of a sunnier star, Spirits from beyond the moon, Oh, refuse the boon!