Poetry Analysis

Asleep in the Valley by Arthur Rimbaud The poem starts with a blissful scenery. The mention of flowers, streams, mountains, the valley, and how the rays of the sun reached the mountaintop emits cheerful thoughts from the readers. By reading the first paragraph, readers would want to go to the place the author described. They would also have their own conclusions that the poem would end in a happy note. In the second paragraph, a young soldier is being introduced by the author. Readers would be curious. What is the soldier doing sleeping in the valley? "Pale in his warm, green, sun-soaked bed." This was the one-line description that would make the readers think why the soldier is being described as pale and what role or what kind of impact the soldier has in the poem. In the third paragraph, the author gives a description of the soldier. The way he slept and how his smile is being compared to with an infant's. An infant is seen as an innocent and serene thing with no cares in the world, so it gives this sense of peacefulness and tranquillity at the same time gives an eerie vibe. In the fourth paragraph, this is where the cold reality of the situation hits. "The humming insects don't disturb his rest; He sleeps in sunlight, one hand on his breast; At peace. In his side there are two red holes." Upon reading this, readers would understand how the author used irony, he made the scenery and the situation both contradictory to each other to make a bigger impact on what is actually being shown. I noticed how the author used the colours: green, blue and red. Green represents the scenery and how majestic it is at first, and then blue for the soldier's cold, pale and lifeless body. And then he transitions to the colour red, blood. He closes in on the soldier's sides, with two red holes that implies that he has been shot and that the soldier is dead. The irony of the situation is clearly implied. The transitioning of the poem from blissful to heartbreaking was smooth. Everything that happened in the poem was unanticipated, but in the end, the situation was made clear. Not everything is what it seems. At the start of the poem, who would have thought it would end in a tragedy.