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A noiseless patient spider,
I marked where on a little promontory it stood isolated,
Mark’d how to explore the vacant vast surrounding,
It launch’d forth filament, filament, filament, out of itself,
Ever unreeling them, ever tirelessly speeding them.
And you O my soul where you stand, Surrounded, detached, in measureless oceans of space,
Ceaselessly musing, venturing, throwing, seeking the spheres to connect them;
Till the bridge you will need be form’d, till the ductile anchor hold,.
Till the gossamer thread you fling catch somewhere, O my soul.
SUMMARY AND CRITICAL ANALYSIS
Introduction. A Noiseless Patient Spider, is a short but highly inspiring poem possessing good lyrical qualities. From vulgar masculine love the poet rose to a sublimated love between the sexes and from it he rises further to a spiritual love of which this piece can be considered a preliminary example. The ten lines are couched in rhythmic alignment.
Summary. A noiseless spider was noticed by the poet. It was perched on a small promontory. From its isolated spot it was launching forth fine gossamer cobwebs in order to explore the vast expanse of its surroundings. The poet in the latter half of the poem indirectly compares his soul to this spicier. The soul seeks to erect a bridge by flinging its own gossamer thread till it is able to catch somewhere in the measureless oceans of space.
Critical Analysis. The spider that the poet observed on the promontory wants “to explore the vacant vast surrounding”.
It launched forth filament, filament, filament, out of itselfEver unreeling them, ever tirelessly speeding them
The spider is noiseless and patient. In comparison with the vacant vast surrounding, it is only a tiny speck. Still, it perseveres in sending forth the cobweb. So also the soul,
Surrounded, detached, in measureless oceans of space,Ceaselessly musing, venturing, throwing, seeking the spheres to connect themTill the bridge, you will need be formed, till the ductile anchor hold.The allusion is to faith and spiritual anchorage.
A well-known critic comments: “Here is solitude with a vengeance, in a vacancy so vast that any soul seen at its center trying to comprehend and inhabit it, looks terribly minute”. The main theme of the poem is “loneliness”. The epithets of “Noiseless” and “Patient” applied to the spicier in the title as well as the opening line brings out the pathos of the situation. “Ceaselessly musing” “venturing”, in regard to the soul reveal the perseverance of the soul in its eager pursuit of an essential spiritual love. The symbolic application of the image of the spider, as a critic has aptly put, “demonstrates in a very complex and subtle sense the path between reality, his soul and the reader‘s soul and reveals his yearning for the ‘gossamer’ connection”.