Around me stood the oaks and firs; pine-cones and acorns lay on the ground; over me soared the eternal sky, full of light and of deity; again i saw, again i heard, the rolling river, the morning bird; — beauty through my senses stole; i yielded myself to the perfect whole. in the lines above, the speaker is taking in the small details of the natural scene around him. what does he really mean when he says the last line? the speaker gave up and died in nature the speaker, by living in the moment of that scene, can understand how all the pieces work together in harmony the speaker needed to use his senses in order to understand how a river to make the trees around him grow the speaker will only find perfection when he lets go of his preconceived notions of beauty