Second Stanza: Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?

In the second the stanza, the speakers shifts his focus from a description to a direct address of the season, speaking to autumn as if it were a person: Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find / Thee sitting careless on a granary floor, / Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind. Autumn now appears as a woman whose soft -hair is blown by the wind. This personified autumn may also be found in the fields drowsing with the fume of poppies. Oth er times this autumn person may be found like a gleaner thou dost keep / Steady thy laden head across a brook. Autumn is also found by a cyder-press watching the sweet cider being pressed by the apples that had bent the trees.

In the second stanza, there is an evident personification[3]. The poet starts asking a rhetoric question (line 12) to autumn which now is not only a woman but a gleaner. However, this woman is apparently resting in a granary or in the landscape: Or on a half-reaped furrow sound asleep, Drowsed with the fume of poppies

As she is not working with her hook, some flowers, that were going to be cut, remain untouchable (lines 17 and 18). Also we can see an image of her hair gently moving. The stanza ends with autumn patiently watching the last oozings of cider.
In the second stanza Autumn is personified as a harvester, to be seen by the viewer in various guises performing labouring tasks essential to the provision of food for the coming year. There is a lack of definitive action, all motion being gentle. Autumn is not depicted as actually harvesting but as [12] seated, resting or watching. In lines 1415 the personification of Autumn is as an exhausted labourer. Near the end of the stanza, the steadiness of the gleaner in lines 19 20 again emphasises a [14] motionlessness within the poem. The progression through the day is revealed in actions that are all suggestive of the drowsiness of afternoon: the harvested grain is being winnowed, the harvester is asleep or returning home, the last drops issue from the cider pres
the second stanza, the speaker describes the figure of Autumn as a female goddess, often seen sitting on the granary floor, her hair soft-lifted by the wind, and often seen sleeping in the fields or watching a cider -press squeezing the juice from apples.
[13]

The ongoing ripening of stanza I, which if continued would become unbearable, has neared completion; this stanza slows down and contains almost no movement. Autumn, personified as a reaper or a harvester, crosses a brook and watches a cider press. Otherwise Autumn is listless and even falls asleep. Some work remains; the furrow is "half-reap'd," the winnowed hair refers to ripe grain still standing, and apple cider is still being pressed. However, the end of the cycle is near. The press is squeezing out "the last oozings." Find other words that indicate slowing down.

Notice that Keats describes a reaper who is not harvesting and who is not turning the press. Is the personification successful, that is, does nature become a person with a personality, or does nature remain an abstraction? Is there a sense of depletion, of things coming to an end? Does the slowing down of the process suggest a stopping, a dying or death? Does the personification of autumn as a reaper with a scythe suggest another kind of reaper--the Grim Reaper? Speak the last line of this stanza aloud, and listen to the pace (how quickly or slowly you say the words). Is Keats using the sound of words to reinforce and/or to parallel the meaning of the line? Click here for vocabulary and allusions in stanza II.
With stanza two earlier hints of personification are developed. Autumn is a reaper "sitting on a granary floor" but not grim - merely drowsy with "the fume of poppies.' He is addressed with the pronoun "thee," which is reserved for human beings or their anthropomorphisms. Who among us has not seen him? He has hair that is "soft-lifted by the winnowing wind." Personification is seen to be a combination of visual and tactile imagery and a variety of metaphor. It is midday and he has been busy cutting swathes, operating, the cider press, watching with "patient look . . . the last oozings."
Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store? Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find Thee sitting careless on a granary floor, Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind; Or on a half-reaped furrow sound asleep, Drowsed with the fume of poppies, while thy hook Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers; And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep Steady thy laden head across a brook; Or by a cider-press, with patient look, Thou watchest the last oozings, hours by hours.