Style of “Kubla Khan” Poem by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Poetry has always been used as a form of stylistically constructed literature to convey the message in an artistic yet firm manner. Kubla Khan is one of those poems that makes you apply all senses in analyzing the poem. Reading through it, I found that I could feel, smell, and almost touch the elements therein. Some of the objects described by Coleridge in the poem are surreal, such as the “forests ancient as the hills” (Coleridge line 9), while the author depicts a natal point where the earth is described as breathing with “fast thick pants” (Coleridge line 18). The combination of these points gives the poem a feeling of excitement to discover the wonders of Xanadu and fear for the mystery therein.

The fountain is heard through the description given in lines 19-22. The fountain is described as mighty, momentary, and with “huge fragments that vaulted like a rebounding hail” (Coleridge lines 19-22). These lines help me to hear the rebounding of the fountain and its mighty burst. The author describes the meandering river as having a mazy motion as it flows “through wood and dale” (Coleridge lines 25-26). This description evokes in me the kind of fear one gets inside a maze, excited to behold the magical beauty yet afraid of the unknown.

Coleridge ends his poem by reflecting on the dread of beholding Kubla Khan. He depicts it as one that should be approached with holy dread, for he has “Drunk the milk of paradise” (Coleridge, line 54). From the description, the author’s intention was to caution people against approaching the sacred place made by Kubla Khan. In lines 49 and 50, the author asks us to beware of “his flashing eyes and floating hair” (Coleridge line 50) to imply that the spirit associated with Xanadu was scarier than the dome, the fountain, and the river he had described before.

Work Cited

Coleridge, Samuel Taylor. Kubla Khan, Or, a Vision in a Dream. D. Gatti, 2000.