When I lie tangled in her hair
And fettered to her eye,
The birds that wanton in the air
Know no such liberty.
The poem interestingly uses images of being trapped to portray freedom. The speaker is “tangled” in Althea’s hair and “fettered” to her eye. However, he feels as free in this confinement as birds flying through the air.
When flowing cups run swiftly round,
With no allaying Thames
These lines describe a drinking party. The alcohol that they are drinking is pure. In other words, it has not been cut down with water, such as one would find in the River Thames in London.
When thirsty grief in wine we steep,
When healths and draughts go free
The speaker and his companions drown their sadness in wine until they are not sad any longer. Grief is “thirsty” because it requires alcohol to be cured. As the servings of alcohol (”draughts”) get passed around, they frequently raise toasts (”healths”) to the king.
When like committed linnets I
With shriller throat shall sing
The speaker compares himself to a finch in a cage, though he admits that his voice is more shrill than that of a songbird.
Enlarged winds, that curl the flood,
Know no such liberty.
Even expanding winds that flow over the waves are not as free as the speaker when he is praising his king.
Stone walls do not a prison make,
Nor iron bars a cage
Just as the mere presence of stone walls does not make a place a prison if one is free on the inside, iron bars are not enough to make a place into a cage.
