“The Sick Rose”

O Rose thou art sick.

The invisible worm,
That flies in the night
In the howling storm:

Has found out thy bed

Of crimson joy:
And his dark secret love
Does thy life destroy.

Summary

The speaker, addressing a rose, informs it that it is sick. An “invisible” worm has stolen into
its bed in a “howling storm” and under the cover of night. The “dark secret love” of this
worm is destroying the rose’s life.

Form

The two quatrains of this poem rhyme ABCB. The ominous rhythm of these short, two-beat
lines contributes to the poem’s sense of foreboding or dread and complements the unflinching
directness with which the speaker tells the rose she is dying.

Commentary

While the rose exists as a beautiful natural object that has become infected by a worm, it also
exists as a literary rose, the conventional symbol of love. The image of the worm resonates
with the Biblical serpent and also suggests a phallus. Worms are quintessentially earthbound,
and symbolize death and decay. The “bed” into which the worm creeps denotes both the
natural flowerbed and also the lovers’ bed. The rose is sick, and the poem implies that love is
sick as well. Yet the rose is unaware of its sickness. Of course, an actual rose could not know
anything about its own condition, and so the emphasis falls on the allegorical suggestion that
it is love that does not recognize its own ailing state. This results partly from the insidious
secrecy with which the “worm” performs its work of corruption—not only is it invisible, it
enters the bed at night. This secrecy indeed constitutes part of the infection itself. The
“crimson joy” of the rose connotes both sexual pleasure and shame, thus joining the two
concepts in a way that Blake thought was perverted and unhealthy. The rose’s joyful attitude
toward love is tainted by the aura of shame and secrecy that our culture attaches to love.

The Sick Rose by William Blake

‘The Sick Rose’ by William Blake is a two stanza poem that is separated into two sets of four
lines, or quatrains. These quatrains follow a consistent rhyme scheme that conforms to the
pattern of ABCB DEFE. This very even pattern contributes to the overall tone of the text. It
helps foster a feeling of dread, as if something is going terribly wrong. 
Summary

‘The Sick Rose’ by William Blake describes the loss of a woman’s virginity through
the metaphor of a rose and an invisible worm.

The poem begins with the speaker telling the rose that she is sick. This sickness is caused
by  the “invisible worm.” The phallic-shaped worm comes to the rose at night in the middle
of “the howling storm.” There is a real sense of danger and dread in these lines that only
builds as the poem progresses and Blake makes use of enjambment.  In the second stanza
of ‘The Sick Rose,’ the worm finds the rose’s bed. The rose is afflicted with the worm’s
“dark secret love” and has its life destroyed. The worm, which clearly represents a phallus,
kills the rose—the woman’s, virginity.

Analysis of The Sick Rose 

Stanza One 

O Rose thou art sick.

The invisible worm,

That flies in the night

In the howling storm:

In the first stanza of the poem, the speaker begins by addressing the rose. Blake chose to
capitalize the word “Rose” in order to give it more agency and relate it more to an animate
being. This makes sense when one considers the larger metaphor the lines are alluding to. He
tells the rose that it is “sick.” This is a very broad term, and it is unclear at first how or why a
rose would be sick. The next lines provide the answer. 

There is one main reason for the “sickness,” the “invisible worm.” It is not something that is
easily imagined, considering that it “flies in the night.” But, the general shape and the fact
that it is, by Blake’s estimation, hurting the rose, is what’s important. The phallic-shaped
worm comes to the rose at night in the middle of “the howling storm.” There is a sense of
danger and dread in these lines that adds to one’s knowledge that the worm is not going to do
anything good to the rose. 

Analysis of The Sick Rose 

Stanza One 

O Rose thou art sick.

The invisible worm,

That flies in the night

In the howling storm:

In the first stanza of the poem, the speaker begins by addressing the rose. Blake chose to
capitalize the word “Rose” in order to give it more agency and relate it more to an animate
being. This makes sense when one considers the larger metaphor the lines are alluding to. He
tells the rose that it is “sick.” This is a very broad term, and it is unclear at first how or why a
rose would be sick. The next lines provide the answer. 

There is one main reason for the “sickness,” the “invisible worm.” It is not something that is
easily imagined, considering that it “flies in the night.” But, the general shape and the fact
that it is, by Blake’s estimation, hurting the rose, is what’s important. The phallic-shaped
worm comes to the rose at night in the middle of “the howling storm.” There is a sense of
danger and dread in these lines that adds to one’s knowledge that the worm is not going to do
anything good to the rose. 

The rose is afflicted with the worm’s “dark secret love” and has its life destroyed. Again,
these lines could refer to the actual death of a real rose that is eaten by a worm. But,
the extended metaphor is more important. The worm, which clearly represents a phallus,
destroys the rose—the woman’s virginity. As was the case in Blake’s day, and in many
places is still of importance today, the loss of virginity doomed a woman’s prospects for the
rest of her life. This is the death and sickness the speaker is referring to. 

The Sick Rose” Summary

Oh rose, you are sick. An unseen worm has flown under the cover of a dark and stormy night.

The worm has discovered your bed of deep red joy. Now, the worm's dark, hidden love is
destroying your life.

“The Sick Rose” Themes

Death, Destruction, and Innocence

“The Sick Rose” is one of William Blake's most hotly contested poems—there are many
theories out there as to what the poem means! What is clear, though, is that the poem features
two main characters: a rose, and an “invisible worm” that has made the rose sick. If the rose
is read as a symbol, as it often is, for the natural beauty and majesty of creation, then the
poem becomes an allegory for such beauty's inevitable destruction—for the fact that nothing
can last forever, and that death and decay come for all living things. The rose's fate may also
represent the corruption of innocence by the harsh realities of the world.

Roses, with their complex network of colorful petals, often represent both love and loveliness
in literature, and that seems to be what's happening in the poem as well. In its mention of the
flower's “crimson joy,” the poem associates the rose with vibrant, natural beauty. But this
rose is also “sick,” thanks to the “invisible worm” that's tracked the rose down.

Roses, like all plants, do literally face various dangers from worms, bugs, insects, and other
pests. The beauty of the rose offers no protection against these kinds of external threats. On
one level, then, the worm might represent the idea that death, destruction, and decay come for
all living things. The worm—a creature of the dirt, burrowing deep in the dark muck of the
earth—may also represent the way that earthly society inevitably corrupts even the purest and
loveliest of beings.

The fact that the poem personifies the worm as a hardy and determined figure—one that flies
at night of “howling storm” in order to have its way with the rose—further suggests that the
forces of destruction and/or corruption will always get their way in the end, that, inevitably,
the rose will lose its innocence and die.

It’s worth remembering that this poem appears in Blake's Songs of Experience, which offers
a kind of real-world take on the innocent perspectives and ideas presented in the poet's
earlier Songs of Innocence. While the former book celebrates the majesty of creation,
the Songs of Experience show how this creation is corrupted and destroyed—an idea that
seems to line right up with the worm's destruction of the rose.

Sex and Desire

“The Sick Rose” is often interpreted as an allegory for the corrupting influence of sexual
desire. That said, William Blake was actually an advocate for sexual liberation well ahead of
his time. With this in mind, the poem seems to critique the way that sexual unions are so
often shrouded in secrecy, darkness, and shame. The poem thus becomes an allegory not for
the corrupting influence of sexual desire itself, but for the damage caused by
the suppression of that desire.

A rose is a conventional symbol of love, romance, and femininity (often linked to the vagina
itself). In this context, the worm can read as a phallic representation of the male sexual organ,
which here seeks to penetrate the rose’s bed (meaning both flower bed and the conventional
type of bed). The poem certainly plays with these connotations, with the rose’s “bed” offering
up a kind of “crimson joy.”

But though the worm represents strong desire, it can only act on this desire by remaining
hidden. And despite the mention of “joy,” the union between the rose and the worm is neither
openly joyful nor celebratory. The worm’s desire is “dark,” “secret,” and can only be fulfilled
in the anonymity afforded by travelling during a “howling storm” at night. The worm’s desire
is literally and figuratively forced underground, perhaps gesturing towards societal ideas
about sex that are based on shame, guilt, and sinfulness.

The nature of the worm’s so-called love, then, is damaging and destructive. It seems that it’s
the “dark[ness]” and secrecy of the worm’s love that “destroys” the rose’s life—rather than
the action of loving itself. While love is usually something positive and nourishing, here is a
vision of love corrupted into a deadly force. While love is usually life-affirming, here it’s a
killer. And though the poem doesn’t delve too deeply into what makes this love so corrupt,
it’s the worm’s distinguishing feature of invisibility that makes this union so grotesque. The
rose doesn’t even necessarily know of the worm’s existence, adding another unsettling layer
of seediness and secrecy.

In the unhealthy union between worm and rose, then, sex and desire cease to be joyful,
(re)productive, or creative. Though sex is the method by which the human race maintains its
presence on this planet, here sex—or its suppression—is a destructive, evil force. The worm
is invisible, both there and not there. That is, though sexual desire is ever-present, its natural
fulfillment depends upon the prevailing attitudes towards sex. Arguably, then, the sickness of
the rose stands in for the sickness of repressed sexuality in general. In other words, the poem
suggests that society has lost perspective on the naturalness—and innocent joy—of sex.

Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis of “The Sick Rose”

Line 1

"The Sick Rose" opens with apostrophe as the speaker addresses the rose itself. Though this
line is simple and spare, it does a lot. The use of "O" makes the poem sound like a kind of
lament, as though the speaker is mourning the rose's imminent death. The long
/o/ assonance in the first two words—"O Rose"—heightens this effect. The third vowel sound
in the poem, "thou," has similarly round, open feel. Together these vowels suggest weariness,
but also the rose's beauty, grace, and elegance.

These /o/ vowels also make the sound of the line's final two words all the more pronounced.
Both "art" and "sick" are very different sounds from "O," "Rose," and "thou," with two
different vowel sounds at work alongside harsher consonants. The final hard /k/ sound of
"sick" ends the line on a note of unpleasantness and disease.

The end-stop at the end of the line serves the same purpose, making "sick" visceral and loud.
This sets-up the rest of the poem as a kind of explainer that will give the rose—and the reader
—more information about why (and how) the rose is sick.

The Sick Rose: summary

‘The Sick Rose’ is easy enough to summarise. The speaker addresses a rose flower which is
diseased, because some foreign agent (described as an invisible worm) has discovered the
rose bed and is destroying the flower’s vitality. But of course, this leaves all our work ahead
of us in working out what this rose, and this worm, are meant to represent.

In his study of William Blake, the scholar D. G. Gillham draws a helpful distinction
between metaphorical and symbolic imagery, arguing that in ‘The Sick Rose’ Blake does not
compare one thing neatly with something else (metaphorical), but rather offers up an image
(or collection of images) without telling us what they are to be compared to.

This makes ‘The Sick Rose’ symbolic, because the rose, its bed, and the worm which
destroys it are all clearly representative of something else, but Blake does not tell us what this
something else is.
This is what makes a poem like ‘The Sick Rose’, and a number of other Blake poems, so
rewarding but also so mysterious: the imagery contains rich symbolism but it would probably
be unwise to reduce such imagery to a simple ‘rose = love’ equation. Some words of analysis
may therefore be helpful.

The Sick Rose: analysis

How we interpret the meaning of ‘The Sick Rose’ depends largely on how we choose to
analyse the poem’s two central images: the rose and the worm. It is possible to see the worm
as a symbol of death, given that worms are associated with decay and are commonly said to
feed upon the dead (we are ‘food for worms’ in our graves).

By contrast, roses are often associated with love, beauty, and the erotic: the stuff of life. In
this interpretation, what the poem presents us with is the constant conflict and tension
between life (with all of its pleasures and joys) and death (which is always present in the
background).

Note that the destruction of the rose has not been completed, but is ongoing: decay and death
are continual processes, rather than sudden acts. ‘O Rose thou art sick’; ‘Does thy life
destroy’ (not Did).

In Blake’s poem we get several hints that such a reading is tenable:

Has found out thy bed

Of crimson joy:
And his dark secret love
Does thy life destroy.

The rose is in a ‘bed’, suggesting not just its flowerbed but also the marriage bed (or even,
perhaps, the bed of unmarried lovers); not only this, but it is a bed of ‘crimson joy’, which is
not quite as strong a suggestion of sex and eroticism as ‘scarlet joy’ would have been, but
nevertheless bristles with more than simple colour-description. (The rose may literally be
crimson, but this bright, deep red suggests lifeblood, beating hearts, and perhaps carnal
appetites as well.)

We should also bear in mind the implied genders of the two central images in this poem: the
(phallic) worm, accompanied by the masculine energies of that howling storm, is implicitly
male, while the delicate rose, being a flower, is more readily aligned with femininity. (It is
perhaps worth reminding ourselves that Blake capitalised Rose in his first line, leading us to
remember that as well as referring to the flower, Rose is also a girls’ name.) In Blake,
destructive forces are often male.

The problem of symbolism

Why is the worm flying in Blake’s poem? This is also puzzling, and disturbs us. Worms
wriggle and crawl: they aren’t known for flying. Clearly this is a symbolic worm, denoting
some sort of corruption at a more metaphorical level. The fact that the worm is a creature of
the night suggests that it is like a demon or other night-visitor which feeds upon people as
they sleep (back to that ‘bed’ again), like a succubus or incubus sexually ‘feeding’ upon
sleeping victims.

This would tally with the fact that the worm harbours a ‘dark secret love’ for the rose: is the
worm guilty of jealous love for the rose, whose beauty and ‘joy’ it envies? Is this a version of
Nietzschean ressentiment, or Oscar Wilde’s statement that ‘Each man kills the thing he
loves’? Or perhaps the sort of thing we encounter in another William Blake poem, ‘A Poison
Tree’?

This might explain the ‘howling storm’ in which the worm ‘flies’: the turbulent emotions and
turmoil generated by resenting and hating that which one loves, conflicted desire and disgust.

Certainly, a Freudian analysis of ‘The Sick Rose’ is tenable. Freudian psychoanalysis is all
about unconscious drives, fears, desires, and neuroses; note how the worm in this poem is
invisible, flies in the night, and possess a love which is dark and secret. Secret to the
harbourer, even, we might ask? As the theatre critic Kenneth Tynan once remarked, a
neurosis is a secret you yourself are not even aware you’re keeping.

The fact that the worm chooses to fly in the night suggests something seeking to travel and do
its work under cover of darkness, perhaps because of shame; night also suggests the world of
sleep and dreams, when our unconscious comes to the surface in the form of symbols
(symbols not unlike those presence in this poem).

Perhaps, though, the shame is not the result of some evil desire or deed but of Christian
indoctrination: especially during Blake’s own time, sexual desire was viewed with suspicion
and shame by many, as a result (in large part) of Christian teaching, which taught that it was
sinful unless it took place within marriage (and, in many teachings, purely for the purpose of
procreation, rather than pleasure).

So an adolescent growing up and developing feelings of sexual attraction and longing may
well feel a sense of shame because of the social and religious attitudes attached to all things
sexual. The fact that the worm is flying in ‘The Sick Rose’ raises it (literally) above the level
of the wrigglingly physical and into the realm of the abstract and psychological. Certainly the
‘howling storm’ can be interpreted as a symbol for the tumultuous and tempestuous years of
adolescence and sexual awakening.

The poem might be read, slightly differently, as a take on Christian doctrine: ‘worm’ can also
be a poetic word for ‘snake’ or ‘serpent’, and this conjures up the Garden of Eden (that bed of
roses again?). The Satanic serpent which persuaded Eve to eat the fruit from the Tree of
Knowledge is motivated by a desire for revenge against God, and the pure earthly paradise
God has established with Adam and Eve.

One way to bring us closer to an interpretation of ‘The Sick Rose’ is to compare it with
another poem, one which Blake chose not to publish in Songs of Experience alongside ‘The
Sick Rose’ but which was left in manuscript form. In his excellent study of Blake’s
poetry, Blake’s Contrary States: The ‘Songs of Innocence and Experience’ as Dramatic
Poems , D. G. Gillham productively compares ‘The Sick Rose’ with this manuscript
poem:

I saw a chapel all of gold

That none did dare to enter in
And many weeping stood without
Weeping mourning worshipping

I saw a serpent rise between

The white pillars of the door
And he forcd & forcd & forcd
Down the golden hinges tore

And along the pavement sweet

Set with pearls and rubies bright
All his slimy length he drew
Till upon the altar white

Vomiting his poison out

On the bread & on the wine
So I turnd into a sty
And laid me down among the swine

As Gilham notes, this poem’s message is easier to analyse than the meaning of ‘The Sick
Rose’: it’s clearly about ‘the religious and social prohibitions placed on sexual experience’
and how, when sexual desire inevitably leads to the breaking of religious ‘laws’ concerning
intercourse, the whole ‘sanctuary is defiled’. The serpent in this manuscript poem is the
‘worm’ of ‘The Sick Rose’, entering and defiling with its ‘poison’.

‘The Sick Rose’, although written in clear, plain language, is an enigmatic poem whose
meaning remains difficult to pin down. Therein lies much of its haunting power.

About William Blake

William Blake (1757-1827) is one of the key English poets of the late eighteenth and early
nineteenth centuries. He is sometimes grouped with the Romantics, such as William
Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge, although much of his work stands apart from
them and he worked separately from the Lake Poets.

Introduction

The poem The Sick Rose by William Blake is quite deep, difficult to understand and full of
various themes. We cannot conclude a single meaning to this poem. I have read a dozen of
online and offline resources and will try to throw light on most of the themes which can be
drawn from this poem.
The poem is very short having just two stanzas having 4 lines each. The rhyme scheme is
ABCB DEFE. The poet uses personification throughout the poem. As this verse is published
in The Songs of Experience, we find dark themes and bitter reality.

1st Perspective – Simple Summary

The poet is in conversation with a Rose, which is the symbol of beauty. He tells the rose that
it is sick because an invisible worm (symbol of decay and destruction), which flies in the
night full of the dreadful storm, has found its (Rose’s) bed of crimson joy i.e. its lustful soul
or hidden desire. Hence being experienced and using its dark secret love, it has now
destroyed the life of a rose.

In simple words, the poet says that the experienced worm (which is hidden) has come to
know the desire hidden behind the innocent beauty of the rose and using its pretentious and
wicked love, it has destroyed the beauty or innocence or the red colour or even its life.

2nd Perspective – Romanticism vs Industrialisation

William Blake is a Romantic Poet. Hence he is against industrialisation and the problems
which arose because of it. Romanticism symbolises innocence while industrialisation is all
about the experience because the former was about idealism and the latter about realism.

Now, having said that, let us try to look at the poem in this perspective. The Rose here
depicts an innocent human who lives in nature. But soon a worm i.e. industrial revolution
comes which make him materialistic and hence sick. The worm is invisible because in the
pursuit of money a man cannot see the dark things that accompany it.

The desire for money and worldly comfort alienates him from the society, God, family,
friends and peace. Thus he becomes sick. The “night” here symbolises the dark reality of
industrialisation and “the howling storm” refers to poverty, slums, diseases and the worst
noise of machines in the industrial set up.

The poet says that this worm or Industrialization is successful in finding the hidden desire (of
worldly pleasures) in man and hence it comes with the greed money which ultimately
destroys the life of mankind.

3rd Perspective – Goodness vs Evil

The third perspective that we can find in the poem is that of Good vs Evil. It goes back to
Adam and Eve. The Rose, in this perspective, can be the innocence of Adam and Eve living
in the garden of Eden.

The worm i.e. Satan is hidden that flies in the night to them one night and find the hidden lust
and desire of Adam and Eve and ultimately lead to their expulsion from Heaven.

4th Perspective – Religion vs Modernisation

With the development of science and technology, the belief in God was attacked by Rational
minds. Rather than following their religion, they started accomplishing their worldly desires.

In this perspective, the poet is referring to the virginity of young girls which is like the
innocent rose. But when the sex becomes common the virginity became something outdated
thing. The poet says that the rationality and the freedom of doing whatever one desires are
like a worm which flies in the night (sex is more common during the night).

The idea of freedom made the people follow their desires (forbidden) which has destroyed the
morale and ethics of humanity.

5th Perspective – Feminism

I think feminism has also been reflected in this poem because the theme revolves around vag-
ina, phallus, virginity and the org-asm (crimson joy). The man or the phallus is the sign of
patriarchy which is hidden (behind the phallus). It flies in the night and because of lustful as
well as dominating nature and pretends to be true love.

However, hidden behind it is the psychology of dominance. It pretends to satisfy the vag-ina
(by giving it pleasure in the form of org-asm) but in reality, it is destroying the woman-power
which lies in virginity (according to the poet).

Thus this poem can be interpreted in many ways and as it is a poem, every perspective is
relevant and true. Hope you understand the poem now.

William Blake The Sick Rose

Table of Contents

William Blake The Sick Rose

William Blake as a Poet

Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience

Substance of The Sick Rose

Central Idea

The Sick Rose Poem Summary

The Sick Rose By William Blake Analysis

The Sick Rose Analysis Line By Line

The Sick Rose Theme

Symbolism in The Sick Rose

Related posts:

William Blake’s ‘The sick Rose‘ is a poem taken from The Songs of Experience. It is really
difficult a poem to understand fully because basically the poem is symbolical in nature
highlighting Blake’s own created philosophy. Any poem written by Blake can be explained
from different levels – personal political psychological mythological and archetypal
interpretations because Blake followed the ancient sacred tradition of prophets and thinkers
with spiritual insight. So ours effort will be to understand the simplest symbolical level of
understanding. The poem ‘The Sick Rose‘ presents a vision of a rose attacked in a stormy
night by a destructive worm. Symbolically we may say that it refers to the destruction of love
by selfishness, of heavenly innocence by materialistic experience, of spiritual life by physical
lust.

William Blake as a Poet

William Blake was the foremost poet of the group called the ‘Precursors of Romanticism.
From boyhood days he had the visions. So his poetry glows with spiritual intensity and is
simple and sublime. As he was a professionally trained engraver, he published his own poems
using process called ‘illuminated printing’. So to understand his poems in a much better way,
the painting and engraving with the original poem help a lot.

Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience

These two volumes of poems reveal Blake’s philosophy the best. Human life on this earth can
be divided into days of innocence’ and ‘the days of experience. A newly born babe is the
symbol of innocence, is as innocent as God Himself. All the qualities of God – simplicity
gentleness, meekness and mildness are perceived in a little child. With the progress of time,
the child becomes involved in materialistic pleasure more and more and becomes forgetful
about the previous heavenly existence. The child, as grows commits sinful activities one after
another and those sinful activities are called worldly experience. He or she makes himself or
herself more and more away from God and enters into the world of experience, the painful
days. Though the world of experience is painful for everyone, it is needed because with death
on this earth, the soul goes back to the world of better innocence, the abode of God, Heaven,
wherefrom it came first as a little child on this earth. This philosophy of Blake gets the full
expression.

Substance of The Sick Rose

The speaker, addressing a rose, informs it that it is sick. An invisible worm, that normally
flies under the cover of night, and in the midst of extreme storm has entered into the bed of
the rose. The bed of the rose is of red warm joy. And the worm’s dark, secret love destroys
the life of the rose itself.

Central Idea

Apparently the poem is about a rose and a worm, but obviously there is some hidden meaning
in the poem. Thus ‘rose’ and ‘worm’, ‘joy’ and ‘destroy’ are paired off. The first words in
each pair suggest beauty and happiness, whereas the second words in each pair suggest evil
and destruction. It seems to us that the dark secret lover, travelling in a stormy night stealthily
found out the warmth of the ‘bed of crimson joy and destroys its life. While good or virtue is
indicated by ‘bed of crimson joy’, evil is indicated by a number of words, like ‘sick’, ‘worm’,
‘night’, ‘storm’, ‘dark’, ‘secret’, ‘destroy’ etc.

The Sick Rose Poem Summary

The advent of genuine romanticism in English literature occurred and flourished with the

publication of Lyrical Ballads in 1798 by Wordsworth and Coleridge. A group of poets took
birth with immense potential just before that romantic period. William Blake was one of them
with real genius. He followed the old sacred tradition of prophets and thinkers with spiritual
insight

The poem ‘The Sick Rose’, included in Songs of Experience symbolically presents human
life on this earth. When a child takes birth, actually his/her soul freshly comes from the abode
of God, so purity is a vital part of childhood days. But with advancement on earth, everyone
must have to enter into the world of experience, which is always painful, torturing for the
soul. So, days of experience are the days of sinfulness.

The poem The Sick Rose tells us how the beauty and soft youth of a rose becomes destroyed
by a worm. The speaker addresses the rose and informs it that it is sick. An invisible worm
that normally flies under the cover of night and in the midst of extreme storm has entered into
the bed of the rose. The bed of the rose is of red warm joy. And the worm’s dark, secret love
destroys the life of the rose itself.

The dark secret love of the worm is actually the path of destruction of the innocence and
beauty of the rose. Here the rose symbolically stands for innocence, and it is destructed by the
worm, the agent of the world of experience. So symbolically the presentation is unique.

The Sick Rose By William Blake Analysis

The Sick Rose is a poem not only symbolical but also with moral meanings. The world of
innocence becomes destroyed by the world of experience, the phase of spiritual existence
surrenders to grossly materialistic pleasure that brings spiritual death. The rose which stands
for purity or innocence is perhaps, ruined by experience – the worm. Again the rose which is
the symbol of love is perhaps destroyed by selfishness and physical lust. The rose which is a
symbol of beauty is dragged down on earth by jealousy and ugliness. So in our earth every
good is surrounded by evils.

In William Blake’s ‘The Sick Rose’ both the world of innocence and the world of experience
are presented. Where the rose is the symbol of beauty and innocence, worm is the symbol of
experience and spiritual death where innocence is destroyed by experience. All these are
God’s design. Innocence must show the path to the world of experience how much painful it
may be for the sake of the world of better innocence, the Heaven.
In the poem, the poet informs the rose about the secret attack of a worm to destroy it. The
rose is youthful, beautiful and with soft heavenliness. In the midst of howling storm of the
night, in the midst of darkness the worm has entered into the bed of the rose. The bed is with
warm crimson joy. So it is sorrowful that the rose will be destroyed by the evil nature of the
warm.

Here, in the poem “The Sick Rose’, the rose which stands for purity and innocence is ruined
by the worm, the experience. While good or virtue is described by ‘bed of crimson joy, evil is
indicated by a number of words like sick, storm, night, howling storm, dark, secret destroy.
So it shows that on this earth good is surrounded by evil. This is the moral lessons from the
poem.

The Sick Rose Analysis Line By Line

Lines – 1: Thou art sick – you are sick,

The poem opens with the address of the speaker to the rose telling the rose that it is sick,

Lines – 2-4: Invisible (adj) – that cannot be seen, not visible,

Worm (n) – small creatures that causes disease,

Howling [adj] – very great extreme,

Storm – violent weather condition with strong wind,

The worm is described as invisible. Probably as it flies in night, in darkness, the small worm
remains invisible. It can also fly in the midst of great stormy night. The description of the
worm and its journey in the night denotes evil, deceit hypocrisy and pain.

Lines – 5-6:

Crimson – red in colour,

The worm has found out the bed of the rose. It is the place of crimson, warm joy. Crimson
joy may denote physical, earthly pleasure which provides warmth but ultimately brings
spiritual destruction and death.

Lines – 7-৪ :

Secret– hidden,

Destroy – destruct,

Love is normally associated with life, but here as the love is ‘dark’ and ‘secret’ it brings
destruction for the rose. So here the love is not spiritual, it is physical, sexual, earthly.

The Sick Rose Theme

Innocence overpowered by Experience

Love

Sex

Destruction

Transience of Physical Beauty

Evil Intention

Symbolism in The Sick Rose

The Rose – Allegorically the rose is a conventional symbol of love. It also symbolizes
beauty, innocence and purity.

The Worm- The image of the worm echoes the biblical serpent. Worms are inclined to
earthbound, so they symbolize death, decay and destruction.

Bed- The bed into which the worm enters symbolizes the lover’s bed.

Dark Secret Love- suggest the deceptive nature of the worm

Crimson- The colour crimson symbolizes the secret passion

Crimson Joy- It stands for sensual joy or sexual gratification.

The Sick Rose by William Blake: Summary and Analysis

The Sick Rose was first published in William Blake's poetry collections Songs of Experience
in 1794. This poem is one of the inexplicable poems in English literature because of its
precise meaning which is difficult to draw a fix meaning. There are many possibilities of
different interpretations of the analysis of The Sick Rose.

William Blake (1757-1827)

The speaker of the poem addresses the Rose and informs her that she is sick. The cause of her
sickness is a worm that is invisible and it howls in the storm at night. The invisible worm
infects her with his dark secret love and destroys her life.

William Blake has consciously used the language of personification. In the poem, human
qualities have been attributed to both 'rose' and 'worm'. Here, rose is made sick. Similarly, the
worm has the power to 'make love', 'find out bed', and 'enjoy crimson'. Language of
personification works with a great deal to provide symbolic identity to the function and the
implication of the words of the poem. In this short and beautiful poem, Blake uses symbols
connecting the sensuous with the emotional and the moral meaning. As a visionary poet, he
uses symbols in an elusive way. Apparently, the poem is about a rose and a worm, but it is
obvious that there is a hidden meaning in the poem. The things and the situation described in
the poem are all symbolic. They imply something more than what they are. Blake uses
contrast as a poetic device to convey his meaning. Thus, rose and worm, joy and destroy are
paired off.

Both good and virtues are indicated by the number of words in the poem. Evil is indicated by
a number of words: sick, worm, night, howling storm, dark, secret, destroy. The worm stands
for evil. It also connotes the ideas of lust, sin, destruction, corruption, and death. The worm is
a mystery as it is described as "invisible". It is engaged in secret activities: finding the bed,
expressing dark and secret love. The rose stands for purity, innocence, beauty, ignorance, and
so on. The innocent rose is ruined by an experienced worm. The rose is a thing of beauty,
which is ruined by jealousy, and sexual passion of the worm. The rose is a symbol of love,
which is destroyed by selfishness. A crimson rose has been entered, sickened, and destroyed
by a worm. This destruction may symbolize the destruction caused by secrecy, deceit,
hypocrisy, and pain. In The Sick Rose, the secrecy of love becomes a disease. The crimson
joy' suggests rose's complicity both in passion and in secrecy. So the poet has compared sick
love with sick rose. The love of a demon (worm) is nothing meaningful and hopeful rather it
is mystic and tragic, painful and destructive.

If the poem is looked through feminist perspective, the worm can be patriarchy. Patriarchy is
all-powerful and capable to destroy woman race. The worm symbolically presents Biblical
serpent and it is the symbol of corruption, moral degradation and it is something that is a
destroyer and an exploiter. The male worm and female rose have a Freudian significance. The
worm is invisible, a hidden and repulsive thing. Scientifically speaking, there is no worm,
which flies in the night and in howling storm. It is an earthbound insect. The image worm
suggests phallus. It visits rose secretly. "Howling storm" symbolizes a chaotic and beastly
emotional crisis going on about him while he takes his dark flight. The words night, invisible
worm, howling storm, dark and secret love, and destroy connote sexual intercourse between a
rose and a worm. In psychoanalytic criticism, the worm stands for phallic image. It stands for
the male sexual organ. A woman feels herself inferior and insecure due to that sexual organ.
A rose is attacked on a stormy night by a destructive worm. Its images carry a weight of
secondary associations. We may say that it refers to the destruction of love by selfishness, of
innocence by experience, of spiritual life by spiritual death.

The poem has been presented as the love that is destructive like a worm. The tragic tone of
the love is the central part of the poem. The speaker of the poem is telling the destructive love
by comparing the mystic and tragic love affair of the couple. One is compared with sick rose
and another is compared with the destructive worm, which visits at the night time.

The poem is short and sweet having the figurative voice. The poet has attributed the high
quality of the human world as male and female. So this poem is the poem of high sound of
the human world with destructed life.