The World is Too Much With Us

The world is too much with us; late and soon, Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers: Little we see in Nature that is ours; We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon! This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon; The winds that will be howling at all hours, And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers; For this, for everything, we are out of tune, It moves us not.--Great God! I'd rather be A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn; So might I, standing on this pleasant lea, Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn; Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea; Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn.

In the octave of this Petrarchan sonnet, the poet complains

that we are obssessed with worldliness, consumerism and spending.

They take too much of our time, preventing us from noticing

Nature in all her glory. We do not see the sea's nocturnal wonders

nether do we notice the wind's actions. In the sestet, the poet

prefers to be a pagan who is close to Nature to see Proteus

rising and Triton blowing his horn so that he can be in harmony

with Nature.