Flower sonnet VI

The sixth sonnet of the River Duddon series is not your typical sonnet.   Instead of having a theme of love or having some kind of shepherd chase after someone that he love, there is a feeling of peace and normalcy.   The atmosphere gives a feeling that the time is around spring.   The sonnet mentions numerous trees that surround the general area.   Small birds being sighted all over the forest and the hum of bees as they pollinate the flowers that envisions peace.    There is also a calm feeling you get when reading the lines, “And caught the fragrance which the sundry flowers, fed by the stream with soft perpetual showers, plenteously yielded to the vagrant breeze”.

            This sonnet is a Petrarchan sonnet because of it’s the rhyme scheme follows an ABBA ABBA CDE CDE scale.   In the octave part of the sonnet, it focuses on the description of the forest, rivers, and the flowers.   It shows true nature at work as it describes the bees pollinating the flowers and the birds making a living within the forest.

            The volta in this sonnet takes place after the first line of the sestet.   The line, “The trembling eye-bright showed her sapphire blue” gives a sense that the plant is dangerous, even though it has been used for generations as a medicine to help cure eye irritation.   The last line of the sonnet, “All kinds seemed favorites of Heaven” shows that everything is there for a reason.   All of things that were created in the forest are there is so serve its purpose in life whether if it is good or bad.   Everything is part of system that works with each other.