Perspective of Children

Dylan Thomas’s “Fern Hill,” Fleur Adcock’s “The Video,” Theodore Roethke’s “My Papa’s Waltz,” and Margaret Atwood’s “Bored,” each provide the reader with differing perspectives of the world from the eyes of children. The contents of the poems show how the innocence and imagination of children.
Thomas’ “Fern Hill” shows the reader the idealized world of many young children. The language Dylan uses and the tone of the poem relate a very carefree and happy childhood. As young children imagine, Thomas describes his dreams of being a prince and spending all of his time playing. He uses colors in order to vividly paint the picture of his youth, for instance “fire green as grass…like a wanderer white with dew.” Children view the world as a joyful place and simple colors, smells and sights awe them. We see animals and the sun and the moon everyday and do not think much of it, but children see the world through innocent and imaginative eyes, which allows them to appreciate the simple things in life. The words of this poem allow us to see the pleasure that a carefree life brings them.
Fleur Adcock’s “The Video” similarly portrays the sheer joy felt by children with the simple things in life. The irony in this poem depicts the innocence of youth and how imagination rules their lives. With something as simple as a video, Ceri is able to “make her (sister) go back in,” and bring life back to what it used to be, before her “Mum had gone back to being thin,” and “twice as busy.” For children, removing what they do not want from life is much more simple than in reality and this poem reveals that innocence that children possess.
In contrast to these two poems, Roethke’s “My Papas Waltz” reveals the harsh reality that many children are forced to face. From the eyes of the narrator we see a view on the world from a child, one of which we would not expect. The first line tells the reader what to expect from the poem and similarly many other words vividly describe the pain of this child. The lines “the whiskey on your breath…. battered on the knuckle…. right ear scraped a buckle…you beat time on my head,” show the reader the conditions in which this child lived however the remaining lines depict the innocence that remains in children despite the treatment they receive. The content of the poem draw the picture of a child clumsily dancing with his father in the kitchen, while the mother is angered by the mess and the noise, but at the same time the few harsh words relate the abuse this child felt. Being naive, children are able to view the world as a happy and carefree place.
Atwood’s “Bored” also portrays the innocence that children posses. The speaker of this poem tells of a time when she was younger and happier and her father was alive. She is so vividly able to describe every movement and every sound that her father made while he was working. And although she was bored as she watched him work, she found happiness in that boredom. She questions why it is that she found happiness in that boredom although she “could hardly wait the hell to get out of there to anywhere else,” and at the end of the poem she realizes that she was happy because she did not know too much as she does now which emphasizes the point that the imagination and lack of a sense of reality allows children to find happiness in everything.