can anyone tell me what this poem means???? I don't get it !?

Question

La Belle Dame Sans Merci ( The Beautiful Lady Without Mercy) by John Keats

Ah, what can ail thee, wretched wight,
Alone and palely loitering?
The sedge is withered from the lake,
And no birds sing.
Ah, what can ail thee, wretched wight,
So haggard and so woe-begone
The squirrel's granary is full,
And the harvest's done.

I see a lily on thy brow
With anguish moist and fever dew,
And on thy cheek a fading rose
Fast withereth too.
I met a lady in the meads,
Full beautiful, a faery's child:
Her hair was long, her foot was light,
And her eyes were wild.

I set her on my pacing steed,
And nothing else saw all day long;
For sideways would she lean, and sing
A faery's song.
I made a garland for her head,
And bracelets too, and fragrant zone;
She looked at me as she did love,
And made sweet moan.
She found me roots of relish sweet,
And honey wild, and manna dew,
And sure in language strange she said,
"I love thee true!"
She took me to her elfin grot,
And there she gazed and sighed deep,
And there I shut her wild, sad eyes--
So kissed to sleep.

And there we slumbered on the moss,
And there I dreamed, ah! woe betide,
The latest dream I ever dreamed
On the cold hill side.

I saw pale kings, and princes too,
Pale warriors, death-pale were they all;
Who cried--"La belle Dame sans merci
Hath thee in thrall!"

I saw their starved lips in the gloam,
With horrid warning gaped wide,
And I awoke and found me here,
On the cold hill side.

And that is why I sojourn here,
Alone and palely loitering,
Though the sedge is withered from the lake,
And no birds sing.

Answer 1

Sure, I love Keats here is a brief report I did on this particular poem.

John Keats, “La Belle Dame sans Merci” is a ballad written in dialogue form with the first three stanzas being addressed to the knight and the rest being the knights’ reply. The ballad is presented in medieval style; however, it is not the typical type of medieval tale. There are no fair ladies, triumphant love affairs, nor handsome knights. Instead, Keats presents a dark tale of a knight who has met a beautiful seductress, best described as death.
The ballad begins with a stranger asking the knight why he looks so “haggard” and “woe begone” and why his face as quickly paling. In reply, the knight tells the tale of how he met a beautiful woman who pretended to love him. The knight describes her seduction of him, “She found me roots of relish sweet, / And honey wild, and manna dew, / And sure in language strange she said—/ I love thee true” (Stillinger and Lynch 899-900). With simple language Keats conveys that this woman is seducing the knight; lulling him into a false sense of security. She is feeding him “manna” which is reference to the Bible and the heavenly food that God sent to rain down upon his chosen people. In referencing to “manna” Keats is contrasting the dark, mysteriousness of the woman and her “wild wild eyes” with the foolish knights’ misconception that she is somehow heavenly. As the knight continues, the story gets darker. The knight is “lulled” to sleep by the mysterious woman and he begins to dream about pale warriors, kings and princes who cry out, “La belle dame sans merci/ Hath thee in thrall!”. In these lines, the dead, who have previously fell prey to “the lovely lady without pity”, are warning the knight that he is next. Upon waking the knight realizes that the mysterious woman is death so sits alone and pale beside a “withered” lake; dying.
With the understanding gained from the introduction it becomes apparent that the knight is Keats himself and that the mysterious woman is death. Keats’s description of the knight is eerily similar to the way he must have looked while slowly dying of tuberculosis, “I see a lily on thy brow/With anguish moist and fever dew,/ And on thy cheeks a fading rose/ Fast withereth too. In these lines we are giving the image of someone pale, whose color is fading. Descriptive words like “moist” and “fever dew” give the image of a feverishly ill man in the final hours of death; which is undoubtedly a mirror image of how Keats looked and felt.

Answer 2

First verse - be calm and honest. Accept that although you are right, it doesn't have to mean the other person is wrong. Don't show off, and don't "give way to" hate. Second verse - Be an optimistic realist. Believe that anything is possible, but not everything is probable. As to thinking - if you have an idea, follow through with it. And never give up! Third verse - oh, right, only the first two? =O

Answer 3

This poem is about a man.
It is winter time, its cold, there is no food.
Wretched wight : Very miserable and distressed person or creature that has been used in an ironic fashion.
The man dreams of finding peace, love, comfort and warmth.
The woman in the dream is likely to be mother nature.
"La belle dame sans merci, hath thee in thrall" : The beautiful lady without mercy has you in-slaved.
In-slaved meaning in this case, there is not much you can do to make the winter end and spring come any sooner.

Answer 4

The Beautiful Woman Without Mercy

Answer 5

to me as he spends the beginning of the winter alone, when all on the earth is dead around him, he conjurs up lust and life with his imaginery lady and once again gets to feel like all is alive around him .. he misses summer and all it's beauty and spendor... that is when he feels most alive...