Destroyer and Preserver


“Destroyer and preserver” (Shelley 14)

Shelley is creating a paradox when describing the force that is known as the “wild West wind”(1) by stating that it is both destruction and salvation at the same time. The wind is killing off and scattering the leaves onto new places far from the original trees, thus it is a destroyer of life. These leaves are a symbol of the death and disease that the wind carries and the destruction that it leaves in its wake. Throughout the first section of the poem, the wind is killing the leaves, and it is made so apparent that they are dead since the leaves are compared to corpses in a grave; “Each like a corpse within its grave” (10). But, by spreading the leaves the wind is giving the leaves and the seeds that they might carry the ability to spread out and reach the soil so that when spring comes, they can grow, thus it is preserving life and the cycle of it. The wind moves and in turn, spreads seeds as a part of the debris that it picks up. Moving these seeds around protects them from the coming storm and allows them to be able to germinate when the spring winds come. Therefore the west wind destroys and ends life, while at the same time creating and preserving life. 

-Megan Williams

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