Spring and All Theme of Transformation

Transformations are a major way Williams approaches nature in this poem. What he describes is "just" the changing of the seasons, but he makes it into a really big event. The world is changing, transforming itself from brown to green, from dead to living, from cold and windy to calm and warm. As Williams puts it: "the profound change has come upon them." It’s the big shift in the poem, so it’s definitely worth underlining here.

1. Do the words in the poem change along with the scenery? How does Williams’s language reflect and describe the idea of transformation?
2. If the changes of spring are happening underground, how does the speaker see them? The magic of poetry? X-Ray vision? You decide.
3. If the world is being transformed in this poem, does that change the speaker, too? Do you get the sense that he or she is undergoing a kind of rebirth?

By the end of this poem, spring has changed everything, including the speaker.