surprising that a Christian poet like Wordsworth should be aware of Hindu/Buddhist ideas of reincarnation. He seems to have intuited these truths from his own deep reflection.
The poem tells of how our birth onto this world is like falling asleep and forgetting the life we have come from in Heaven. Wordsworth believed that between lives we return to Heaven, rest for a while with God, and then return to a physical body here on earth. Our time with God is like our waking state; our birth as a baby is like a dream-state, in which we gradually forget more and more about the heavenly home from which we come.
For Wordsworth the child is closer to nature (and thus to God) than adults. The child is still surrounded by ‘clouds of glory’ which come from Heaven. But as the child grows older and becomes an adult, the vision and sense of Heaven begins to fade – and in the end the old man (or woman) is left with the light of this world only, and can no longer see the beautiful shining light of Heaven.
This poem teaches us that the child and youth are ‘nature’s priest’ – the communicator between God and man. We can learn much from young children, as they are still close to the heavenly world which they recently left and thus have a clearer sight of Heaven than older people.