The speaker looks across a flat, green country with sadness and hopelessness—there are no mountains here, no comforting slopes. But when she closes her eyes, tall, stately peaks rise before her, calm in any weather. One blue, distant summit, touched by the earliest morning light, belongs to her childhood. That mountain held all her dreams. She remembers how it endured snow, scorching sun, and summer storms, yet she loved it most in the bright flash of lightning. Finally, the mountain becomes a living, sorrowful presence: it bows its purple head beneath rolling clouds and lets a veil of silver rain slip down like tears. A quiet longing fills the poem, an intimate affection that mixes nostalgia for a lost childhood landscape with a tender, almost reverent love. There’s gentle melancholy here, but also a deep sense of comfort found in memory.
Mountains — Summary
Over the green and level land My sad eyes wander without hope ; Here no rejoicing mountains stand, No strong and friendly slope.
But ever when I close my eyes Tall mountains rear their stately forms. Against the sky I watch them rise, Serene in calm or storms.
One in the distance rises blue, Haloed by morning's earliest beams. This was the peak my childhood knew. About her clung my dreams.
Over her pallor fell the snow, The hot sun scorched her fertile breast. But in the summer lightning's glow I always loved her best.
She bowed her purple head in pain As clouds rolled up from threatening space, And let a veil of silver rain Slip down across her weeping face.