The seed I spent or sown it where
The land is his and none of mine?
We speak like strangers, there’s no sign,
Of understanding in the air.
This child is built to my design
Yet what he loves I cannot share.
a. What kind of a relationship does the father and son share?
b. Explain the line ‘The child is built to my design’.
c. Explain why the stanza reflects a universal sentiment?
(3 marks)
Dear student,
The answers are as follows:
The answers are as follows:
- The relationship between the father and the son in the poem by the same name, it is quite evident that poet has presented us with the common predicament that plagues every parent-child relationship. As soon as the child grows up, he starts depending less and less on his parents who used to be the centre of their world. This growing distance is puzzling for any parent and difficult to cope with because now their child is becoming independent and self-reliant. The father cannot communicate with his child, its as if they speak different languages now. This communication gap being created by the difference in ages and mentality. The same people who had lives together under the same roof become alienated from each other, they appear as strangers who have to start anew in building a relationship between two adults now. Their tastes, preferences and interests are different, each unable to understand the other. But even then the father would like nothing better to reach out an olive branch and shape a new love from sorrow. This is keeping in mind that they are after all father and son,nothing can break this indissoluble bond. The anger that ferments is due to a gap in communication, all that is required is building a bridge between the two because the yearning is from both sides.
- In the poem “Father to Son” by Elizabeth Jennings, the father says the above line by which he means that his son has been brought up in the environment and with the values that he provided the latter with and hence should be like his father in most aspects.
- The stanza talks about the kind of a relationship or estranged equation all the children face with their parents, specially with their fathers. Though we look like our fathers, we do not think or talk like them and this conflict in ideas often affects the relationship adversely.