Ode to Psyche

• Themes

  • Power and beauty of imagination
  • Myth
  • Spirituality
  • Romantic nature
• Structure

  • This poem has no proper form, and Ode to Psyche is considered the loosest form of literary work.
  • There is no metrical scheme, an exact number of lines in each stanza, and rhyme scheme. The length of each stanza dramatically varies from the other, the first stanza contains 12 lines, and the second one is shorter with simple meanings and pentameters.
• "tuneless numbers, wrung By sweet enforcement and remembrance dear, And pardon that thy secrets should be sung Even into thine own soft-conched ear:"


  •  ‘Tuneless’ implies that the poetry is not worthy of the ear or eyes of Psyche.
  • The verb ‘wrung’ suggests that it takes effort to write the ‘tuneless’ lines
  • ‘soft-conched’ = ‘shell-like’ - shape of the sea-shell with the softness of flesh - contradiction. The line is slow, with elongated vowels - Keats attempting slow persuasion to gain Psyche’s permission to write
  • The view that the poem is about poetry itself is evidenced in this opening.
• "I wander'd in a forest thoughtlessly, And, on the sudden, fainting with surprise, Saw two fair creatures, couched side by side"


  • Greek myth of Eros and Psyche. The ‘forest’ metaphor is introduced and continues throughout - The forest has multiple associations; Garden of Eden; an unspoiled world, the secrecy of protective trees; the creative process of writing poetry.
  • The speaker, or poet, wander’d ‘thoughtlessly’ - randomness of creative process, how inspiration emerges unconsciously. The verb ‘couched’ is possibly an echo of ‘soft-conched’ in line four.
• "'Mid hush'd, cool-rooted flowers, fragrant-eyed, Blue, silver-white, and budded Tyrian, They lay calm-breathing on the bedded grass; Their arms embraced, and their pinions too; Their lips touch'd not, but had not bade adieu,


  • description of a couple in love - lush imagery, invokes all the senses - synaesthetic association in ‘fragrant eyed’, a mix of seeing and smelling. ‘Tyrian’ is a purple dye - colour of the flowers.
  • ‘silver-white’, 'calm-breathing' and ‘fragrant-eyed’ - dense description adds to the impact.
  • couple frozen in not quite a kiss,
• "And ready still past kisses to outnumber At tender eye-dawn of aurorean love:"


  • The couple are prepared to exceed the number of kisses they have previously enjoyed.
  • The line ‘tender eye-dawn of aurorean love’ is inventive and original. The compound noun ‘eye-dawn’ suggests awakening to light, and ‘aurorean’ is another reference to the light of dawn. Light imagery can be tracked through the poem.
• "No voice, no lute, no pipe, no incense sweet From chain-swung censer teeming; No shrine, no grove, no oracle, no heat"


  • long list - repeated refrain of ‘no’s emphasises Psyche’s freedom; her worshippers would have no formal framework or sacred location. She has none of the trappings — no temples, no altars, no choir to sing for her. Ironically, though she has no alter with flowers in her forest with Eros as described in the first stanza, she is surrounded by blooms.
  • The ‘chain-swung censor’ is a reference to the Catholic tradition of incense.
• "When holy were the haunted forest boughs, Holy the air, the water, and the fire... thy lucent fans, Fluttering among the faint Olympians,"


  • Keats creates an eerie, mysterious mood with the ‘holy … haunted forest boughs’. Three essential elements, air, water and fire, have a special mystical quality that extends from antiquity to the present.
  • Lucent = radiant, continuing the theme of light in various forms. Keats is referring to her wings that have retained their glow, while the ‘faint Olympian’ are outmoded gods, no longer exerting power.
• "Yes, I will be thy priest, and build a fane In some untrodden region of my mind,Where branched thoughts, new grown with pleasant pain,"


  • The speaker wishes to build a temple (fane) in his mind - worship of Psyche is personal, linked to his internal life.
  • ‘branched thoughts’ - the forest where he first saw Psyche and Eros/Cupid.
  • ‘pleasant pain’ - oxymoron - melancholy and his odes blend the themes of joy and sadness - also erotic.
  • Keats' awareness of his poor physical health and the knowledge that he might die an early death, while at the same time pursuing his relationship with Fanny.
• "Who breeding flowers, will never breed the same:"


  • This is the speaker’s note of originality. His respect for Psyche is such that he aspires to something inventive and creative.
  • If one takes the poem to be a metaphor for poetry and creativity, this would be a key line.
  • This is an appropriately neat, rhythmic line, with two matching but opposing clauses — an example of chiasmus. Note also the repetition of “breed” in different grammatical forms, a device known as polypoton, to give emphasis.
• "And there shall be for thee all soft delight That shadowy thought can win,A bright torch, and a casement ope at night, To let the warm Love in!"


  • promises Psyche “all soft delight” - window of her new abode will be left open, so that cupid —”the warm Love”— can come in.
  • conclusion is satisfying - achieved by shortening the line lengths in the sixteenth and final lines - return to ABAB rhyme scheme of opening.
  • mentions ‘Love’ for the first time; not only her ‘winged boy’ but the capitalised love, typical of Romantic poetry - metaphor for the creative inspiration that produced Keats' poetry.