The Bower (Symbol)
The bower symbolizes the impact of imagination on experience. When the poem begins, the speaker views the bower as a place of restriction and boredom. The sheer lack of sensory description he affords it suggests that he pays it no notice. In fact, he describes it only by comparing it to a prison—a cliche metaphor so devoid of sensory vividness or imagery that, Coleridge suggests, the speaker isn't paying much serious attention to the bower. But later, when open-mindedness has replaced self-pity, the speaker describes the bower in great detail, seeing it as a place of rich sensation and lively motion. The bower has not changed, but the speaker has, and the bower exemplifies and symbolizes how much his internal change impacts his external perception.
The Rook (Symbol)
The rook that flies over the speaker at the poem's end symbolizes not only the speaker's friendship with Charles, but also nature's power, more broadly, to connect humans to one another. At the poem's beginning, the speaker envisions nature as a barrier separating him from his friends: the farther Charles walks, the more natural world there is to cut him off from the speaker. By the poem's end, the speaker perceives nature as an all-encompassing force surrounding him and Charles, connecting and unifying them even across great distance. The rook, which the speaker imagines will soon fly over Charles, draws a straight line between the two characters and puts them in communication, though they are miles apart from one another.
