Café Blog

I, Too, Have Wandered

A response to William Wordsworth’s, “I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud.”

By Janelle-Ann Frances

I.

I was walking in the valley, ruminating on a lonely monotonous day. Though lucky as I was, I was wandering in the valley alone, like that single cloud in the sky, ousted by the others. It sailed solo like a little boat in a broad ocean. After a good minute of all this brooding, walking, brooding, walking, I did a double take before realizing there was a man crouching in the distance. In front of him stood an army of daffodils. Daffodils on daffodils, which he was staring at peculiarly. I thought, should I keep on? Should I approach? For this was a strange sight for a woman walking alone. He must’ve felt watched because he looked up in surprise and caught my frozen eyes. After a second of shock, he grinned childishly, then nodded to the yellow battalion in front of him.

“Daffodils,” he said joyfully.

I gave a pensive nod. “Yes...those are…those are daffodils.”

He looked at me with what seemed to be a sort of expectation, that I might say something further about the daffodils. After an unsteady moment, I thought it time to call the interaction quits. I tipped my hat and said in my most polite voice, “good day,” and was on my way. Weirdo, I thought, even though I was no social expert myself. I felt his eyes on me, just as he felt mine on him.

II.

It was a dull afternoon. I stared at the single beam of light leaking through the window, hoping it would take me to a place of thrill and romance. Romance, I thought, can be found in books. I boiled a pot of water for tea, and went over to the mahogany shelf to shuffle through my collection. Was it a good Shakespeare play I needed? No, too dramatic. Milton, Goethe? Too heavy. At that point, I just wanted to stare at the sunbeam, and that’s just what I did. Suddenly, his face came to mind. That childish grin raving about the daffodils. Who was he, and why did he give so much of his soul to the daffodils? Perhaps he was out there at that very moment. I grabbed my hat, my overcoat, and ran outside.

I do admit, the way those little flowers float around in unison with the wind is a grand sight. They don’t garble about frivolous things, they don’t fight. They don’t boast, they don’t analyze everything. Perhaps it’s me who needs to give herself over to the daffodils.