An exploration of how different poets treat parent and child relationships with reference to three poems from the anthology and three others

An exploration of how different poets treat parent and child relationships with reference to three poems from the anthology and three others

The memories of childhood are different for every one of us. Some are joyful, some are heartbreaking. The poems, ‘A Mother in a Refugee Camp’ by Chinua Achebe, ‘Piano’ by D.H. Lawrence and ‘Poem at Thirty-Nine’ by Alice Walker, all show a different parent and child relationships but at the same time come down to one aspect, love and care. The other three poems, ‘Hide and Seek’ by Vernon Scannell, ‘Half-past Two’ by U.A. Fanthorpe and ‘My father thought it’ by Simon Armitage, bring out a slightly different theme of childhood and focus on the feelings of regret and betrayal.
David Herbert Lawrence was born on 11 September 1885. He was an English novelist, poet, playwright, essayist and literary critic. One of his autobiographical poems was ‘Piano’, written in 1918.
Piano is a very emotional poem. It is about a grown man’s memory from his childhood brought by a piece of music. He is being driven into the past as the song progresses, the old days when his mother used to sing and play piano on Sunday evenings, when he was still small, when life was easy. The memory of childhood brings the man to tears.
The tone of the poem is very nostalgic, sentimental and sorrowful. The noun ‘dusk’ provides a grievous and touching atmosphere.
The title ‘Piano’ from my point of view might refer to the man’s mother in the memory. We know that his mother used to sing and play piano when he was a small child, lines 5 + 6 give us evidence for that “And pressing the small, poised feet of a mother who smiles as she/sings.” Therefore, in my opinion, the title of this poem is metaphorical. The word ‘Piano’ is a metaphor of ‘Mother’.
Piano is written in three quatrains with a rhyme aabb, meaning that in each stanza there are two rhyming couplets. Perhaps, the reason why Lawrence has done that is so that the poem could flow just like a piece of music that is being played while the man is being taken into the past. The rhyme could also represent the flowing memories that are streaming through a man’s mind whilst the composition is being played.
The internal rhyme in the first stanza ‘tingling/ strings’ adds a faster pace to the line, emphasizes the two words for the reader and makes the phrase catchy so it stays in the reader’s mind just like it did in the mans. Perhaps Lawrence is trying to give the reader the same effect the music had on the man when he was a child. The phrase ‘tingling/ strings’ also creates a warm and pleasant sound, referring to the music that was played by the child’s mum.
The second stanza is written in past tense. A grown man is being knocked off his feet by the memories from his childhood, the atmosphere is well-founded and warm. The words like ‘cozy’ and ‘tinkling’ give the reader a light and secure sensation.
Even though the second stanza has a positive tone, the word ‘insidious’ – line 7, carries a very unpleasant feeling, and when the adjective is being read out loud the ‘s’ sound gives out a nasty and detestable ambience. The meaning of ‘insidious’ is creeping harmfully without being noticed. In my opinion, the word ‘insidious’ is referring to the memories of the man which are creeping into his head. Perhaps if Lawrence used that word, not all the memories are enjoyable, and in fact, some might be very upsetting and tear-jerking.
Simple rhyme is being used in the second stanza with endings like ‘ong’ and ‘ide’. I think the reason for that was to show the innocence and the simplicity of childhood.
In the third stanza, we are brought back into the present. In this stanza, the man is reaching his emotional climax. He is not listening to the music anymore which brought his memories to him, he doesn’t care about the surroundings, he has been paralyzed by the past. The phrase “my manhood is cast” tells us that he can’t stop himself from flashing back, he is caught up in the memories, he has no control over himself, the feelings from the past are controlling him.
The metaphor ‘flood of remembrance’ – line 14, suggests the flow of memories that are going through a man’s mind. From my own experience, the floodwaters are always dirty and contain all sorts of things in them like: trees; sand; rubbish; pieces of furniture; etc. So in this situation, the ‘flood’ is most likely to describe how mixed up the different, positive and negative memories are and how they race through his mind. It also shows the reader that the man is in an emotionally unstable condition because flood waters don’t stay in one place, they are most likely to move around, evaporate or go down the drains.
Piano is a very sensory poem with the use of vivid imagery. It wakens up the readers feelings and senses, makes the reader see the images of what’s going through a man’s head and how he is feeling. The Poem ‘A Mother in a Refugee Camp’ by Chinua Achebe is an extremely sensory poem with the use of powerful imagery likewise Piano. However, the effect on the reader is completely different.
Chinua Achebe was born on November 15, 1930, in Ogidi in Eastern Nigeria. He was a poet, novelist, professor, and critic. The poem ‘A Mother in a Refugee Camp’ was written between 1967 and 1971, during the civil war between Nigeria and Biafra. During this war period, many people suffered from starvation and disease which they had no cure for. Moreover, in this harsh living condition, countless numbers of young children died.
A Mother in a Refugee Camp is a free verse poem written in third person. It is about a strong relationship between a mother and a child being brought to us though a depressing and sad mood. When ‘Other mothers there/ Had long ceased to care’, the mother being described by Achebe, kept on fighting and giving everything she could to her child, her love for her son was so strong that no words could describe it. The fact that a mother knows that her child will die and still doesn’t give up, in fact does everything to comfort him, impacts the reader a lot emotionally, it invokes pitiful, compassionate and sorrowful feelings. Throughout the poem, the poet tries to point out the horrors of warfare and the accompanying hardships to the reader.
Achebe compared the mother and the son to “Madonna and Child” in the opening line of the poem. In my opinion, the poet has done that to emphasize the innocence and purity of the mother and son. Mary the mother of Jesus had a lot of great qualities. She was a woman of courage, praise, faith and prayer. Jesus was a God’s gift to Mary and he was her everything. She treated Jesus with love and care. As readers, we can see an obvious link between Mary and the mother that is being described by the poet. The mother is faithful and no matter how hard the situation is, she still devotes herself to her son, even though ‘she soon would have to forget’ him. The refugee mother does everything she can to ease and lighten her child’s life, she treats him with love and care, just like Mary did.
To point out the horrendous, severe and harsh atmosphere, Achebe used antonyms. In line 5 “unwashed children with washed-out ribs” the opposites ‘unwashed’ and ‘washed’ create a contrast within the line. The contrast shows that everything’s the opposite of how it’s supposed to be. Normally, the children should be washed to maintain the hygiene because children’s immune system is not fully developed, therefore, not as strong, meaning that germs and bacteria from dirty hands and lack of hygiene can affect their health. Also the children need to be fed properly so that they get enough vitamins, minerals, nutrients, carbohydrates and proteins from their food so that they can grow healthy and get enough energy that will get them through the day. However, the children in a refugee camp are suffering from starvation and malnutrition. They don’t get enough food and the elements from it, they also don’t have the conditions and clean water in order for them to wash themselves and keep good hygiene.
The use of ellipsis in the 3rd line moves the reader into a different moment in time. In lines 2 and 3 “Her tenderness for a son/ She soon would have to forget….” Achebe points out the strong love of the mother towards her son that is going to die soon. After the ellipsis, Achebe switches to a different thought describing the atmosphere the refugees live in. The ellipsis created a slight pause, perhaps it was done to bring out a stronger emotional effect on the reader and to give more time for the reader to understand the horrifying situation. The child dying and a mother isn’t being able do anything about it, so she will have to watch him die slowly and painfully.
In the poem A Mother in a Refugee Camp, the feelings and the relationship between a mother and her child were observed from the side and written in third person by Achebe whereas in The Poem at Thirty-Nine, the feelings are being delivered to the reader in first person by Alice Walker.
Alice Walker was born on February 9, 1944, in Eatonton, Georgia. Walker had 2 mentors, poet Muriel Ruykeyser and writer Jane Cooper at Sarah Lawrence College in New York. Walker’s mentors stimulated her interest and talent in writing, inspired her to write poems.
Poem at Thirty-Nine was written in 1983. It is a free verse structured poem meaning that it doesn’t have a set pattern of rhythm or rhyme. The poem is about Walker’s relationship with her father, she brings back the pleasant memories about her father and the things he has taught her that guided her through life.
Firstly, I would like to focus on the contrasting tone of the poem. It begins with a very somber and mournful tone but with positive memories within it. The languishing and woebegone half of the poem is expressed through verbs like ‘tired’ and ‘grieved’. The woman lets her feelings and regrets out. However, after the third stanza, the contrast in the tone occurs, changing to a more light, optimistic and blissful tone. The adjective like ‘voluptuous’ and verb ‘dancing’ give a sense of positive, satisfying and energetic atmosphere.
The poem starts with a statement “How I miss my father.” Walker repeats the opening line of the poem in the fourth stanza. The repetition of the line separates the poem in two. The poet has perhaps done that to emphasize the contrast in the tone and to make it sound like a new fresh start with only good and pleasant memories, leaving all the oppressive and sad memories behind. The full stop at the end of the sentence is replaced with an exclamation mark. From the fourth stanza, we discover that her father was very active, bright and full of life. In the fifth stanza, the woman mentions that now she looks and cooks just like her father, therefore, the exclamation mark might be used to highlight and represent the woman’s spirit and vigor as well as her positive attitude towards life. It is also used to put an emphasis on how much Walker misses her father.
Walker has put some of the words on their own throughout the poem. I would like to focus on the first stanza specifically. From line 2 to 5, one sentence is being enjambed over four lines. The reason for that was perhaps to emphasize the words. When the words are on their own, they become more noticeable to the reader and when read out loud, a slight pause is being created. It encourages the reader to think about the meaning of the word and of its relation to the situation in a greater detail.
In the first line of the fifth stanza “Now I look and cook just like him” the verbs ‘look’ and ‘cook’ create an internal rhyme. Perhaps, Walker has done that to underline the similarity and to show a strong bond between the father and the daughter.
Ursula Askham Fanthorpe was born on 22 July 1929 in Kent. While working in the neurological hospital as a receptionist in 1974, Fanthorpe stared writing poetry. One of her poems is Half-past Two.
Similarly to the Poem at Thirty-Nine, Half-past Two by U.A. Fanthorpe is written in free verse. It is about a young child who was punished by the teacher for doing ‘Something Very Wrong’ and so had to stay in school until half-past two. Unfortunately, he was forgotten by his teacher and lost the sense of time. In my interpretation, the poem shows how children are not ruled by the time like adults are. The poem brings out a theme of innocence of childhood and reminds us of how easy, pure and simple it was to be a child. It also shows the carelessness of the teacher who doesn’t realize that the he/she hadn’t taught the class how to tell the time yet.
The poem is written in 11 stanzas of tercet. Throughout the whole poem there is no indication of change in time or tone, so it could have been written in one big stanza. I think the reason why Fanthorpe has separated the poem into 11 stanzas was to make it all laid out, simple and organized just like the life of a child.
Fanthorpe uses a lot of personification to create strong imagery, it also gives additional information about the child’s personality and his way of thinking. Lines 16 + 17 “He knew the clockface, the little eyes/ And two long legs for walking,”. Those two lines tell us that the child doesn’t know what clocks do and how they work, so as a result, he compares the clock to something simple and easy to understand and starts imagining a picture in his head. For example, ‘two long legs for walking’ represent the hour and the minute hands of the clock in the child’s head. In order to achieve an even stronger imagery, the poet uses onomatopoeia. The word ‘click’ in line 18 gives us a sound effect of the clocks ‘clicking’. It also suggests that there is pure silence in the classroom because the child can hear the sound the clock makes.
To underline the theme of innocence of childhood brought through the poem, Fanthorpe uses unusual words such as ‘Timetogohomenowtime’, ‘Gettinguptime’ and ‘timeyouwereofftime’ which are simply few words put together as it is difficult for kids to distinguish gaps between the words. This highlights the child’s lack of understanding time.
Next poem is ‘Hide and Seek’ by Vernon Scannell. As well as A Mother in a Refugee Camp, Hide and Seek is a free verse structured poem. Vernon Scannell was born in 1922 in Spilsby, Lincolnshire. Scannell started to get attached to poetry at the age of fifteen. He was interested in writing poems about war and childhood. One of the childhood poems Scannell wrote was Hide and Seek.
The poem contains a detailed description of a familiar childhood game. The persona who is being sought fills up with excitement after choosing a clever place to hide, confident that no one will be able to find him. After a while, the persona feels stiff and cold but still endures the discomfort to win the game. Eventually the child decides to come out from his hiding place when he finds out that other children have long abandoned the search and left him alone. It seems to me that the poem has a deep and important message hidden; that the success might seem to be a step away but we shouldn’t be overconfident and fall into idleness because we might lose everything in a blink of an eye and be left with bitter disappointment, just like the child was.
Scannell uses a few literary devices in the poem. In line 2 there is a repetition of the ‘s’ sound, or in other words, sibilance “The sacks in the toolshed smell like the seaside”. It creates an emphasis on the words and makes the poem flow more smoothly. Sibilance also creates a hissing sound which creates the sound of sea waves breaking down and hitting the shore.
Another literary devise used by Scannell is personification. The phrase in line 19 ‘cold bites’ suggests the discomfort, fear, and cold that the child is experiencing. It also creates a tense atmosphere. ‘The darkening garden watches’ in line 25 is another example of personification, it brings out a very depressing and mysterious image. As well as that, the personification tells the reader that the only thing that’s waiting for the disappointed child is the dark and spooky garden. Lastly, ‘The bushes hold their breath’ in line 26, suggest the silent atmosphere after he’s excitement has gone away with the other children who left him.
The last poem is ‘My father thought it’ by Simon Armitage. The poet was born on 26th of May, 1963 in Marsden, West Yorkshire. He is a British poet, playwright, and novelist.
‘My father thought it’ is a very unique poem because it doesn’t have a proper title. ‘My father thought it’ is just a beginning of the first line which is being used as a title. The poem is about a teenage rebellion which didn’t end up being very successful. The son is trying to be independent and the father is disapproving. The poem has a humorous tone and rhyme, but behind the entertaining tone, there is still pain in remembering adolescence.
The poem is written in three short stanzas, where the twenty nine year old man flashbacks into the past and narrates the story of him piecing his ear and his father disapproving. ‘My father thought it’ is structurally similar to the poem ‘Piano’. They are both written in first person and the structure of the poems is very similar.
Armitage uses some colloquial language in the poem. In the opening line ‘bloody queer’ is used to show the reader how much the father detested and didn’t understand the fact why his son has pierced his ear. Also, it suggested that the father has thought that his son might have homosexual leanings. As well as that, the phrase ‘bloody queer’ gave an impression that the father is down to earth. In the first stanza, very strong rhymes are being used, I think Armitage has done that to show a strong and negative reaction of the father to his son’s piercing.
Finally in the third stanza, the twenty nine year old reflects back at the time when he pierced his ear and speaks with the tone of regret. From the last stanza, it seems like the ear piercing incident has caused emotional pain and problems in the relationship between him and his father. The last sentence of the poem ‘If I were you/ I’d take it out and leave it out next year.’ is written in italics. Even though it’s the man narrating, to the reader, it sounds like what his father might have said.
The theme of childhood really is meaningful for everyone even if it could mean something negative. The 6 poems I have analyzed in this essay show the huge role childhood and its memories play in our life. ‘Piano’ shows how it can end up a grown up man breaking down into tears. ‘Mother in a Refugee Camp’ shows the depressing sides of it during the war period. ‘Poem at Thirty-Nine’ tells us that even if someone you love is gone, the good memories will never fade away. ‘My father thought it’ makes us realize that there is no past without regrets and lastly, ‘Hide and Seek’ and ‘Half-past Two’ bring out the morals which we can learn from. Childhood teaches you lessons but we should be careful not to live in the past. We should use it as a check point to remind ourselves what we have gone through and carry on with our life in present. From this, we can all find our own ways to make our lives better and brighter.