# A Draught of Sunshine explained — Poetry

> Chapter companion for Poetry by John Keats.

## What happens

The speaker rejects earthly wines in favor of drinking sunshine directly from the sky, experiencing a divine intoxication that separates soul from body, leading to a plea for philosophical temperance from Apollo.

## Themes in this chapter

### Dreams and Escape

The speaker seeks escape from earthly bounds through a draught of sunshine, leading to a soul-flight and a desire for divine union.

### Mortality and the Sublime

The poem explores the terrifying division of soul and body, and the sublime experience of approaching the divine, which borders on madness.

## Character check-ins

### Unknown

The speaker who rejects earthly wines and seeks divine intoxication.

### Apollo

Invoked as the God of Song and the Meridian, the source of the golden sunshine and the Delphian pain.

## Key lines

> Hence Burgundy, Claret, and Port, Away with old Hock and Madeira, Too earthly ye are for my sport; There’s a beverage brighter and clearer.

Reject all earthly wines, for they are too mundane; I seek a drink that is more luminous and pure.

_The speaker dismisses conventional alcoholic drinks in favor of a metaphorical, celestial beverage._

> My bowl is the sky, And I drink at my eye, Till I feel in the brain A Delphian pain.

The sky is my cup, and I drink through sight until I experience an inspired, almost painful ecstasy in my mind.

_The act of seeing the sky becomes an intoxicating, visionary experience akin to the prophetic frenzy of Delphi._

> It is an awful mission, A terrible division; And leaves a gulf austere To be fill’d with worldly fear.

This separation of soul from body is a frightening task, creating a stark void that fills with earthly anxieties.

_The speaker describes the terrifying nature of spiritual transcendence and the resulting fear of the mundane world._

> As doth a mother wild, When her young infant child Is in an eagle’s claws.

Like a frantic mother watching her child seized by an eagle.

_A simile illustrating the panic and helplessness felt when the soul is carried away from the body._

## Links

- HTML: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/poetry_14_se/chapters/a-draught-of-sunshine
- Book: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/poetry_14_se
- All chapters: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/poetry_14_se/chapters