Analyzing the The Ecchoing Green - Essay Example

The Echoing Green By Due In this poem, The Echoing Green, allegory is used to a great proportion which describes a particular time in a day and is applicable to real life. A beautiful afternoon of spring is focused upon which shows the joys of children playing on a grassy ground. The poem starts with the sun rising up which is shining brightly and the sky is blue and clear. The birds are singing happily as the people around are ringing the bells to welcome the spring. The children are busy in their games in this pleasant atmosphere.

The explanation of this beautiful afternoon can easily be applied to our real lives. When we are born and are in our childhood, it is the most wonderful time just like the beginning of a new day. Everything good and joyous happens in that part of the life. The rhythm of the first stanza is fast which show the happiness of children playing in the ground. If our life is divided into three parts i.e. childhood, middle-age and old age, the first part is the most wonderful and merry just like the first stanza of the poem.

In the second stanza, the old people are explained who are watching the children play in the ground. They forget their problems for some time. Soon they remember the times when they were children as then they also played like them on grassy ground. This is applicable to real life in its true form. When a person becomes old, the simplest of things remind him of his good old days when he used to be a child. The poem shows how old people feel happy and spry as they watch the children at play. A feeling of sadness can be detected when they sigh, “Such, such were the joys” (Line 17).

The joys of childhood are gone in later years. It is, however, pleasurable and also painful, in old age to remember childhood that can never return. The same ground, The Echoing Green, is used to describe the childhood of the old people which is now in their memory. The time element is changed while describing that. This time, the allegory takes us directly to the old age and into the thoughts of the old people who are thinking about the past and the poem takes us with them to the past.As the sun sets, the children desire to move to their homes.

They are tired and want to rest like the “birds in their nests”(Line 27). The poem shows well how small boys and girls run, jump, play and shout on grassy ground. This is applicable to real life as all the things, good, or bad, have to come to an end. The ultimate reality of life is death. The words “And our sports have an end” (Line 23) very clearly express that all the activities of our life, “our sports”, have an end. The activities of children in the poem came to end when the sun descended.

Similarly, in real life, there is a stipulated time for everything and there are different things that mark the end for different activities. Death marks the end of life. “The Green” darkens and no more play can continue.The poem uses “The Echoing Green”, the grassy ground as an allegory and brings together Nature, Old people, Children and Birds in a series and establishes close links between them. It is on a grassy field in spring when plants flower beautifully and the air is cool and children are playing and the elders are watching them.

The old people attend to the children’s play lovingly. Then past and present serially when the elders are lost in the past of their existence remembering their childhood activities. These childhood activities are reflected in the children’s playful movements. Then lastly, the children and the birds are presented together when they both are shown as resting in the laps of their mothers.Works CitedBlake, William. “The Echoing Green” Poems of William Blake. The Echo Library. 5. Print.