Death of a Young Son by Drowning

Death of a Young Son by Drowning

This poem spoke to me on a certain personal level, not necessarily on the level that I’ve lost a child, because I haven’t, but in recent years I watched my aunt lose her son and the effect that it can have on a family. Margaret Atwood wrote this poem fantastically because she used imagery to show the different things that would always be imprinted in her mind when she lost her son. It’s like the river turns from a metaphor of his life, into an actual thing that takes him away from the world. She also talks about how when her son died, her world stopped, but the outside world, the people that didn`t know him just kept going, and nothing could stop them. She writes “it was spring, the sun kept shining...” meaning that the world kept on turning. My cousin Tyler was eighteen when he was killed in a plane accident, and I know that every year that passes, on the anniversary of his death, I feel like the world should stop spinning, and that everyone should stop and remember for a day. It never happens, but my whole family stops, and just remembers his face and his smile, and his personality. He was so bright, and he was so nice, and it’s hard to believe that someone so full of life could be gone, but I realized that our family isn’t the only one that is affected by the tragic loss of a family member and I believe this poem really shows the feelings that are associated with the loss of a child.