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Wednesday, May 26, 2010 @ 4:37 AM
The poem shows how the lives of children were during the Vietnam War. The children all lived in fear, as the war rages on. They couldn’t see the light where the war will end or when their lives would be better. Chalks and blackboard was unnecessary as no child would be studying in times of war. They are not free, and they cannot escape this fortune.
The poet is a soldier, who resented war. He was sitting in a hotel room and saw the news on TV. In the background, a small boy was forced to carry a gun, most probably to go for war. The soldier felt disgusted at that scene, and felt that the children were mistreated, when children should have freedom, but they don’t.
The situation and setting is during the war period when everyone is afraid and tries to escape from getting killed in the war. There is darkness everywhere and no freedom.
This was written during the war, where everyone lived in constant fear of getting killed. There is no freedom, and everyone lived in darkness. They cannot see the way out of this and many are slowly giving up hope.
There is a rhyme scheme where the poet used “flee” and “free”. The author is trying to point out that it was impossible to get freedom, neither is it possible to escape out of this situation. There is also a repetition for “Could we…” The poet is trying to say that, although he sees this, he can’t do anything to change this. He feels quite useless, not able to help the children. Lastly, he also repeated, “back into the darkness” to show two strong comparison that in the darkness, there is no light, no encouragement, and there is no way to flee, that the people have to survive through this ordeal.