LA eLearning Poetry Response: Rainbow Death

Children In The Darkness

There are children in the darkness
Who have not seen the light
There are children in the darkness
Who someone will teach to fight

Chalk and blackboards will not be
To this door there is no key
From this life they can not flee
And these children are not free

Could we simply light a candle
Could we give them half a chance
Could we teach them how to read
Could we teach them how to dance

Or will a war consume them
Their body and their soul
Will their life and blood be poured
Down some endless thirsty hole

Back into the darkness
From which there is no flight
Back into the darkness
Into which there shines no light

Henry M Bechtold

Task 1

Background Information and Conflict

The poem was written in year 2009, during Christmas by Henry M Bechtold when in his hotel room during his stay at Saigon. The poet was inspired by the photo of a young boy carrying an automatic rifle going to war in the news.

The poet was actually planning to write a poem about girls that are being ill-treated by men when they work in the park, but he wrote another poem, Children in the darkness. In the poem, the poet talks about Children that are involved in war and that they are being robbed of their childhood and forced to be engaged with war.

In the past twenty years, there has been estimated that there are over millions of children that has been used in the war or dragged into with their parents. Children are usually used as nurses, spies. They are in charge if guarding resources, general camps, drum-boys, and worst of all, infantry soldiers who are put at the front line to test out for enemy mines.

2 million children died, 5 million disabled, 12 million homeless, 1 million orphans and 10 million shell-shocked. Children are treated as lower classes of soldiers or recruits in the war as in the context to the poem, Children in the darkness. They are given high risks tasks as they are of low value.

Poet’s Background

I was in Vietnam in 1967 - 68 and again in 1969. I go back often because my soul lives in Vietnam and I go back to visit it from time to time. I was sitting in my hotel room in Saigon just before Christmas 2009 and I was trying to write a poem about the girls who work in the park and how badly men treat them. I was angry but unable to write anything that did not sound trite or weak. I looked at the TV and the news was on. I did not know what the news reader was saying but in the background was a photo of a small boy with a helmet and an automatic rifle. This poem flowed out. The words just came to me and I typed as fast as I could to get it all down.

http://www.warpoetry.co.uk/2010warpoetry.html#Children_

http://www.scribd.com/doc/31962195/Children-in-the-Darkness

Task 2	Analysis
Point of View	The poet assumes a third-person point-of-view, taking much pity on the children whose childhoods are robbed away. The tone, although very much dramatised, are from pure observations and are true. The poet offers a cultural and social point of view, for the children should not be doing the things they are doing at their age. They ought to be enjoying their childhoods, but they have none to turn to. The poet was a first-hand witness of children carrying rifles to war, and hence adds creditability to his account. The point of view is pitiful, and yet depressing.
Situation and Setting	The poem’s timeframe occurs in the present in Saigon, where children are kept in the darkness away from what should be a joyful childhood. Their lives filled with misery and hopelessness, they are fated to take on the roles of soldiers going for war. The conflict in the poem is cultural yet emotional, making the situation very delicate and comprehensive. The theme of the poem is exactly what the title is – Children in Darkness. There seems to be no resolution to the situation, for it is the culture of the place and a tradition to the region. Life is all violent and no smiles for the children there.
Language and Diction	The poem follows a closed form, with regular punctuation and a regular rhyme scheme of rhyming words at the end of every alternate line. The pattern of the poem also adds a sense of melancholy and a monotonous feeling towards its contents. Apart from the series of rhetorical questions in the third stanza, which definitely cannot be fulfilled, the symbol of hopelessness is depicted as “some endless thirsty hole”, as though always ready to suck the life of the children forever. There are other symbols present in the poem, such as “light” in the last stanza, which represents hope and a new life. The children are constantly cooped in “darkness”, and this idea is consistently reinforced to the reader, as evident from the several repetitions of this term in the poem. The style of this poem, although traditional, shows the reality of the today’s world.
Personal Response	Once again, in this poem, we know the truth of war – it really isn’t about fighting for glory. There is never a winner in a war, for everyone loses out. The children here not only lose out on their childhood, but also lose out on their adult life. They are fated to fight for their country, and I’m certain they find no joy in it, but still have to do it. They do not have a choice. The poet aims to evoke a sense of sympathy for these children, by showing his thoughts and depicting his observations. Nonetheless, we all know that it is impossible for this idealistic outlook of life to materialise. The children are isolated, and the poet sees them as inner-souls capable of seeking for new life, but desperate for none.