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Classic and Contemporary Poetry: Explained | |||
Arthur Rimbaud's "Poets Seven Years Old" is a masterful study of the internal turbulence that dwells in the mind of a young child, revealing latent emotional complexities and a precocious poetic sensibility. Rimbaud unveils the clandestine world of childhood, unseen or misunderstood by the adults surrounding the young protagonist. At the same time, he subtly highlights the tension between the innocence of youth and the innate tendencies for darker emotions and fantasies. In this poem, the Mother stands as an emblem of adult blindness, content in her ignorance of her child's inner world, believing that her son is obedient and satisfied. Yet, Rimbaud quickly disabuses the reader of this notion by delving into the child's emotional landscape, brimming with "revulsions" and "nasty habits," capturing his fluctuating states of mind and emotion. The child's disdain for his environment is pronounced. It's not only the physical space-the dark halls, musty drapes-but also the emotional suffocation he experiences that drives him to a retreat within himself. His refuge is found in 'coolness of latrines' where he can think in tranquility. This is not a whimsical child lost in naïve fantasies; this is a seven-year-old introspecting and exploring darker emotional terrain, "dilating his nostrils," and consuming his surroundings in complex, perhaps even pathological, ways. A recurring theme in Rimbaud's work is the notion of "liberty," and it resurfaces here as the young protagonist writes novels "about life in the great desert where ecstatic Liberty shines." Despite his vivid imagination, the child is influenced by illustrated papers depicting Spanish and Italian women-another manifestation of his precocious mind, which borders on sensuality and perhaps taboo. This is compounded by his interaction with the daughter of the workers next door, a scenario that allows the young poet to experience the corporeal, fleshly "savors" that he then takes back to his room. The poem doesn't shy away from exploring the child's complex emotional state and attraction to darker matters. It even suggests that the child is sympathetic towards social outcasts-those "feeble" children who are ignored by society. Interestingly, if the mother discovers him in such activities, it's his "deep tenderness" that takes her by surprise. By the end of the poem, the reader is left with an indelible impression of a child who is far from ordinary. His is a soul restless and anxious for experience, yearning for something beyond his years and given surroundings, and yet enveloped in "dizziness, failings, routs, and pity." Rimbaud's child protagonist, then, is an encapsulation of the poet's own sentiments about life, liberty, and the pursuit of meaning. He embodies a tortured duality-part innocent and part corrupt, struggling to come to terms with his complicated existence in a world that doesn't yet understand him. It is a portrait not only of the child as a young poet but also a foretelling of the turbulent life that Rimbaud himself would later experience. In capturing the essence of this child, Rimbaud has frozen a moment of psychological and emotional volatility, which serves as a microcosm for the complexities of human existence. Copyright (c) 2025 PoetryExplorer | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE THREE CHILDREN by JOSEPHINE JACOBSEN CHILDREN SELECTING BOOKS IN A LIBRARY by RANDALL JARRELL COME TO THE STONE ... by RANDALL JARRELL THE LOST WORLD by RANDALL JARRELL A SICK CHILD by RANDALL JARRELL CONTINENT'S END by ROBINSON JEFFERS ON THE DEATH OF FRIENDS IN CHILDHOOD by DONALD JUSTICE THE POET AT SEVEN by DONALD JUSTICE |
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