“I was here before, a long time ago, / and now I am here again”

Billy Collins and the poetic “Blah, Blah, Blah” of Wordsworth’s “Abbey”

Written in 1798 at the ripe old age of 28, “Lines Composed a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey” seems to chart William Wordsworth’s belief that his poetic skill is dwindling. The poem pays great attention to those places where artists gain inspiration and, ironically, manages to break out of the same inspirational rut it speaks of by being inspired by it. Commonly known as “writer’s block,” this plague is universally inflicted upon all writers at some point. When Billy Collins wrote his parody “Lines Composed Over Three Thousand Miles from Tintern Abbey,” he puts this universality into a better perspective.

Wordsworth opens dramatically. “Five years have past; five summers, with the length / Of five long winters!” (Wordsworth 136). He speaks of the lofty cliffs, the landscape blending with sky, the cottages sprinkling the countryside. Later in the work (around line 58) he begins to speak of “gleams of half-extinguished thought” recognizing in the scene a “sad perplexity,” knowing, however, that “in this moment there is life and food / For future years” (Wordsworth 138). Although the poetic spirit has been confused at the time of the visit, he at least realizes that someday looking back (recollected in the tranquillity he spoke of in the Lyrical Ballads preface) and be able to draw from the scene.

He speaks twice of “forms” (lines 22 and 140). This discussion is important, especially when used referentially to nature, to the question of inspiration. They are, surely, a reference to Platonic philosophy in which the Forms are transcendental beings (beings in the sense that they exist) which serve as models for all beings on earth. For example, all the trees we see are called to imitate the Form tree, and we recognize a tree as a tree because we once dwelled in the world of the Forms as well. As philosophy progressed, the Forms became more internalized. They were no longer something “out there,” but are simply something that is part of our knowledge. Wordsworth takes this stance in line 139 where he states that “thy mind / Shall be a mansion for all lovely forms,…” (Wordsworth 139). In a sense, Wordsworth suggests that we internalize the Forms rather than have them in us from birth. In this way, the artist can take in a scene and remember the scene as it was (or at least ideally was).