Coming of age
This poem is narrated from the point of view of an adult speaker reminiscing about his childhood. He highlights the distinctiveness of those years, foregrounding his distance from his childhood self with the opening words "as a child." His visits to wells touch on common childhood idylls: immersion in nature, curiosity and adventure, and self-discovery. As the poem ends and we return to the speaker's adult state, we learn that he has changed. While he once was carefree and unconcerned with others' judgment and direction, he is now conscious of it and wants to avoid seeming childish or silly. But in other, deeper ways, he remains the same, having channeled his unaltered curiosity about the world into writing poetry. As a whole, the poem suggests that the transition from childhood to adulthood is an art, in which people risk remaining too carefree or becoming too careworn. Finding a creative balance between the two, the speaker suggests, is necessary.
Poetry
The "Helicon" referenced in the poem's title is a mountain in Greece with mythological and metaphorical significance: the streams on it are said to be sources of inspiration for poetry. Thus, from the start of the poem, we are led to understand the wells that fascinate the speaker as sources of poetic inspiration. However, the relationship between the Helicon and the wells is somewhat vague until the poem's final lines. There, the speaker links the poetic device of rhyme to the natural processes of reflection and echoing: after all, all three are patterns of repetition and reverberation. More broadly, he suggests, poetry is ultimately the art of seeking out and creating patterns in language. As a result, it is similar to physical exploration, which is satisfying because it reveals such patterns in the natural world. Therefore, we can conclude, writing poetry is both inspired by, and serves as a substitute for, the speaker's past adventure.
Decay
One of the things that the speaker loves about wells is their unpredictability. Though they are all constructed for the same purpose, they all differ, especially because time and neglect cause them to decay and change. This decay is what causes one bucket to plummet through a deep well, thrilling the speaker with a crashing sound. It also causes weeds to grow over the surface of another well, giving the speaker a momentary thrill as he removes them and catches sight of his reflection. Rather than viewing decay as sad, the speaker sees it as a sign of vitality, often manifesting through the growth of living things. In this way, we see an echo of the coming-of-age theme. The speaker changes as he ages, but he, like the wells, maintains his vitality—albeit in a different form.
