When I have fears -John Keats years old

1.When I have fears that I may cease to be 2.Before my pen has glean'd my teeming brain, 3.Before high-piled books, in charactery, 4.Hold like rich garners the full ripen'd grain; 5.When I behold, upon the night's starr'd face, 6.Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance, 7.And think that I may never live to trace 8.Their shadows, with the magic hand of chance; 9.And when I feel, fair creature of an hour, 10.That I shall never look upon thee more, 11.Never have relish in the faery power 12.Of unreflecting love;--then on the shore 13.Of the wide world I stand alone, and think 14.Till love and fame to nothingness do sink.

1 When I have fears that I may cease to be When I have fears that I may die Cease: stop Cease to be: stop living

2. Before my pen has glean'd my teeming brain, I dont want to die before my pen has harvested all the ideas from my filled up brain. Gleand: gathering the last bit of grain after a harvest. Sustained metaphor: The ideas in the poets brain are like grown wheat that needs to be harvested

3 Before high-piled books, in charactery, 4 Hold like rich garners the full ripen'd grain; I dont want to die before I have filled up a pile of books with writing. These books will hold my ideas like grain silos store the fully ripened grain.

Charactery: the physical act of writing Garners: silo, barn, granary

5 When I behold, upon the night's starr'd face, 6 Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance, When I see on the starry face of the night symbols of romance. Keats is a romantic poet. This means he writes about the beauty of nature. The night sky with the stars and moon is beautiful and romantic. The word cloudy shows there are some clouds in the sky. Personification is used because the night sky has a face.

7 And think that I may never live to trace 8 Their shadows, with the magic hand of chance; I think that I may not live long enough to draw the beauty of nature. I may not live long enough to write the beauty of nature. Magic hand of chance: the hand that writes poetry

9 And when I feel, fair creature of an hour, 10 That I shall never look upon thee more, 11 Never have relish in the faery power 12 Of unreflecting love;--then on the shore And when I feel, beautiful woman, that I will never look at you again, or enjoy your physical beauty of unanswered love. The poet only wants to enjoy the beauty of the woman he does not want to be loved by her. Relish: enjoy Fair creature of an hour: only see woman for an hour

--then on the shore 13 Of the wide world I stand alone, and think 14 Till love and fame to nothingness do sink. Then I stand dying (shore) and think that when I am dead (enter the sea) everything will become nothing. Love and everything will mean nothing.

When I have Fears by John Keats Keats died in 1821 but when he wrote this sonnet in 1818 he was not aware that he would have such a short life. It is tragically ironic that he had these fears. The line of thought develops within each of the quatrains or groups of four lines and the conclusion starts at the end of line 12. Look at the first words of each of the quatrains and you will see how he builds his argument "When I have fears" When I behold" and "When I feel" and at the end of line 12 he makes his final statement "Then I stand alone and think".

His chief anxiety is that he will die before he has been able to write down all the ideas he has. He compares the gathering of his thoughts and ideas into creative writing so that the gathering and storing of grain in garners or storage barns. He feels that his brain is teeming with ideas. There is so much for him to harvest and transfer to writing or charactery that he will store in the form of books which will be piled high. In the second quatrain starting with line 5 he expresses the concern that he will not live long enough to enjoy the natural beauty about which he feels very strongly. He draws great pleasure from such things as the beauty of the night sky, the clouds and the shadows which he finds romantic and mysterious and which inspire him as a writer.

In the third quatrain from line 11 he shows his concern that he might not live long enough to enjoy the beauty of a young woman and love even if it is not returned. But his final statement indicates that he is able to see beyond fame and love as he thinks about the world and the fact that it is the fate of all men to die and he is happy to accept that fate. The shore of the wide world on which he says he is standing is a metaphor for life with death being the sea, the great unknown