Alone; isolation from others (The poem by Edgar Allan Poe)
...an other people did. "I have not seen/ As others saw" Also, he states he was unable to feel deep strong love from the same source as other people. "I could not bring/ My passions from a common spring"(3) "Spring" here symbolizes a origin or source of passion. His source of passion has never been the same as those around him. The speaker compares his view with the views of others, to allow the reader to draw a line between the two and see the difference. His view is completely different from everyone else s. This difference is what makes the speaker an outside. This is the reason he feels isolated. We may then ask the question, what causes him to view things as he does? The speaker never answers this question, but instead offers the term "mystery" as the cause. In addition, the author tells the reader that "mystery" which still affects him is derived from everything good and bad in his life. "From ev*ry depth of good and ill/ The mystery which binds me still." The "mystery" stops the speaker from being able to see the world as everyone else does. It controls him and makes him view everything in a negative context. It causes the speaker to view water as a rushing violent torrent, while others would see it as a peaceful fountain. "From the torrent, or the fountain"(13) The word "torrent" depicts an image of violent rushing energy, while "fountain" portrays an image of peacefulness. When the speaker relates these images to his own perspective and the perspective of others, it emphasizes the difference between his feelings and those of others. Towards the end of the poem the speaker presents images of nature such as "the red cliff of the mountain" and "the sun". The speaker is effective in converting these images into beautiful and calm images when he says "Heaven was blue". However he applies a technique of brackets at the end of the poem. "(When the rest of Heaven was blue)" He uses brackets while he talks about how he se...