The speaker is overwhelmed by the beauty of the woman's voice and her "melancholy" song as he passes by the field where she works. He compares her lovely voice to birds, suggesting that her singing is actually more beautiful than theirs:
No Nightingale did ever chauntMore welcome notes to weary bandsOf travellers in some shady haunt,Among Arabian sands:A voice so thrilling ne'er was heardIn spring-time from the Cuckoo-bird,Breaking the silence of the seasAmong the farthest Hebrides.
He claims that no nightingale's song was ever more welcome to weary travelers in faraway and foreign places than the Scottish girl's is to him. Further, he claims that no cuckoo's voice was ever more welcome to those on the open sea than hers is to him.
Her song has rendered him "motionless and still," as (though he cannot understand her language) it gives him an impression of "natural sorrow, loss, or pain" and "old, unhappy, far-off things." In fact, the sad-sounding mood of the song stays in his heart, affecting him quite deeply, even "Long after it was heard no more."
The poem's speaker is struck by the beauty of the young Scottish woman's melancholy songs as she works at cutting and binding grain. He urges the reader to either stop and savor it as he has or pass by quietly so as not to disturb her.
Her voice, in his estimation, is more beautiful than the voices of the nightingale and the cuckoo as they sing in obscure settings to appreciative audiences. He does not know what causes her to sing such sad songs, and he speculates that it could be due to distant, historical events or matters closer to home and the present day.
The speaker finds that after he has stopped and listened to the maiden's songs, he continues to carry their resonance in his heart and memory; they have touched his soul.
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