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What is the bliss of solitude?

The phrase "the bliss of solitude" appears in the fourth and final stanza of William Wordsworth's poem "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud" (also sometimes referred to as "The Daffodils"). The first three stanzas of the poem recount Wordsworth's joy in seeing a field of "golden daffodils" along a lake on one of his many walks through England's Lake District. The fourth stanza answers the question which closes the third stanza: "What wealth the show to me had brought." In other words, Wordsworth wonders what redeeming quality the flowers may have for him. He acknowledges in the last stanza that when he is alone "in pensive mood" the daffodils "flash upon that inward eye/ Which is the bliss of solitude." That "inward eye" is most certainly the poet's soul or spiritual vision, and when he is alone the thought of the daffodils makes for a unique and extremely pleasurable feeling. It is in this quiet and solitary time that Wordsworth seems to understand the true beauty of the physical world deep down in his spirit as he figuratively "dances with the daffodils."

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