Solitary Reaper - Summary

The poet, in the first stanza, invites the reader/listener to look at the Highland Lass who is singing a song standing alone in the field. She is gathering the crops and she is also singing a beautiful song. The poet asks the reader/listener to either stop and listen to the song or leave the place gently. The solitary reaper is cutting, and she is also binding the grain. Her song has got a melancholy tune to it. The whole valley is filled with the intense song of the girl. 

In the second stanza, the poet compares the song of the girl to the nightingale’s song. The song is more appealing than that of a nightingale. It is so soothing to the tired travellers taking rest in the shade of the Arabian sands. In the same stanza, the poet compares the song to that of the Cuckoo bird. The singing of the girl is so thrilling that it even broke the ‘silence of the seas’ which lay beyond the Hebrides. 

In the third stanza, the poet is guessing the topics/theme in the song of the reaper. He says that the sad song maybe is about ‘old, unhappy, far-off things and old battles’. The second guess is that the solitary girl is singing about some ‘ordinary sorrow, loss or pain which might have happened in the past and may happen again in the future.

The fourth stanza is about the way the poet left the valley. The poet says that the girl’s song didn’t have an ending. He saw her singing at work, bent over the sickle. He listened to her song, without moving. As the poet moved away, he carried the song in his heart and afterwards the song disappeared.