But on the other hand you could say past lives live-on anew in the lives of the living. ![]() ![]() Sometimes to the extend that they might be labelled as ‘living in the past’. As people age they reflect more and more on those that have been important to them in their lives. This poem highlights the impact of the departed on the living and to what extent the dead live-on. How they coped with this is a very personal affair. Children frequently experienced the death of their mother and the death of siblings. This poem was written in 1798 at a time when there were many children in a family and many deaths of young children, and of course, the child-birth death of a mother was a common cause of death. This poem poses thoughts on the extent to which the dead continue to live-on in those still alive. We are seven is the title of the poem and the last line ends with that emphatic statement from the child – we are seven! This is not a very comforting view of the departed and the dear little child is adamant that they are still very much alive in her daily life and cannot comprehend the strange view taken by the adult. And distancing them from daily life for they are dead and should not now be counted as family. The adult has a different perspective taking the traditional view of the dead going to heaven in spirit form. ![]() They are still very much alive to her to the extent she goes to the graveyard and sits with them singing to them and having her supper with them. Clearly it is a very close family and when asked the number of family members she is adamant to include her departed members. The eight year old has lost a sister and a brother but she has four other siblings still alive two living at home (Conway) and two away. Out of interest the adult asks the little girl how many are in her family and then a difference on the understanding of death is clearly seen. This is a conversation ballad between and adult and an eight year old child on the response of the living after close family members die. “Twelve steps or more from my mother’s door, Instead she accepts that things change, and continues to live as happily as she can.“Their graves are green, they may be seen,” She refuses to become incapacitated by grief, or to cast the deceased out of her life. By the end of the poem, however, the reader is left with the feeling that perhaps the little girl understands more about life and death than the man to whom she is speaking. Her siblings are still present in her life. The line between life and death in eyes of the girl disappears. She seems to be in denial about the deaths of her siblings, especially because she claims that she still spends time with them. At the beginning, it appears that the little girl understands very little. The speaker begins the poem with the question of what a child could know of death. The man cannot accept the fact that the young girl still feels that she is one of seven siblings even though two of her siblings have died. It is especially intriguing because the conversation could have been less than five lines, and yet it is 69 lines long. The poem is an interesting conversation between a man and a young girl. The poem ends with the little girl saying, "Nay, we are seven!" The man tries to convince her saying, "But they are dead," but he realizes that his words are wasted. She still stubbornly claims that she has seven siblings. The man again asks how many siblings she has since two are dead. “And when the ground was white with snow, She says that now he lies next to Jane and in this way they are close all the time. She and her brother John had played around Jane's grave until he also died. The girl believes that death released her sister from pain and suffering. The little girl then explains that first her sister Jane died from sickness. “Their graves are green, they may be seen,” The little girl tells him that she still spends time with her deceased siblings what stuns the poet. The speaker says that if two are dead, then there are only five left. Calculation of the speaker does not agree with the calculation of the girl. The narrator is confused and asks her how they can be seven. She replies "Seven are we," and tells him that two are in a town called Conway, two are at sea, and two lie in the church-yard. The speaker then asks the child where her brothers and sisters are. ![]() He asks her how many siblings she has and she replies that there are seven including her. She is crude but very beautiful, and she makes the narrator feel happy. He then meets a little girl who is eight years old and has thick curly hair. The speaker begins this poem by asking what a simple child who is full of life could know about death.
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