To The Foot From Its Child
By Pablo Neruda
Translated by Jodey Bateman
A child’s foot doesn’t know it’s a foot yet
And it wants to be a butterfly or an apple
But then the rocks and pieces of glass,
the streets, the stairways
and the roads of hard earth
keep teaching the foot that it can’t fly,
that it can’t be a round fruit on a branch.
Then the child’s foot
was defeated, it fell
in battle,
it was a prisoner,
condemned to life in a shoe.Little by little without light
it got acquainted with the world in its own way
without knowing the other imprisoned foot
exploring life like a blind man.Those smooth toe nails
of quartz in a bunch,
got harder, they changed into
an opaque substance, into hard horn
and the child’s little petals
were crushed, lost their balance,
took the form of a reptile without eyes,
with triangular heads like a worm’s.
And they had callused over,
they were covered
with tiny lava fields of death,
a hardening unasked for.
But this blind thing kept going
without surrender, without stopping
hour after hour.
One foot after another,
now as a man,
or a woman,
above,
below,
through the fields, the mines,
the stores, the government bureaus,
backward,
outside, inside,
forward,
this foot worked with its shoes,
it hardly had time
to be naked in love or in sleep
one foot walked, both feet walked
until the whole man stopped.And then it went down
into the earth and didn’t know anything
because there everything was dark,
it didn’t know it was no longer a foot
or if they buried it so it could fly
or so it could
be an apple.
Summary of To The Foot From Its Child
- Popularity of “To The Foot From Its Child”: “To The Foot From Its Child” by Pablo Neruda, a Chilean political activist, diplomate, and poet, is a beautiful innocent piece of poetry. The poem seems to have appeared around 1978 and was translated into English by many imminent writers. It personifies the foot of a child, showing its travel from a little foot to a young one without knowing it is going through the passage of time and its final resting place – the grave. The popularity of the poem lies in presenting the entire life cycle of a man through the personification of a foot.
- “To The Foot From Its Child” As a Representative of Human Life Cycle: The poet opens the poem with the description of the foot and how it wants to fly over everything but then it faces defeat and comes to know that it is imprisoned in a shoe. Yet, its adventurous spirit does not subside, and it becomes familiar with its prison just like a blind man. The poet further says that then the toenails become harder in the shoe with the passage of time and change into opaque substances, losing their slenderness and balance.
They turn like reptiles or worms and become hard. Skin grows scales and starts falling but the foot continues moving under the man or the woman in the fields or mines or wherever they go whether it is a store, a government building or they are naked or in sleep or walking or not walking. When death comes to a man, the foot also goes down in the grave without realizing its existence in the world. This life cycle presents an entire lifecycle of a man in that this foot could turn into an apple when it mixes up with the soil. - Major Themes in “To The Foot From Its Child”: The lifecycle of a man, the germination of new life, and the hard life of man are three major themes of the poem. The poet presents the story of a foot, personifying it like it is a living being, showing that it is imprisoned in the shoe and goes through a hard and tough life wherever the man in question goes. Ultimately it goes down in the grave and may become an apple in the next lifecycle. In a way, this metaphor of a foot shows man’s life in struggle and his ultimate destiny to go down in the grave. In the grave, it may sprout into some butterfly or some apple.
Analysis of Poetic Devices Used in “To The Foot From Its Child”
literary devices are literary tools essential for poetic or prose writing. The analysis of these devices in the poem as given below shows this fact.
- Anaphora: It means to use words at the beginning of the next clause such as “without surrender, without stopping” and “without” here is shown as an anaphora.
- Assonance: Assonance is the repetition of vowel sounds in the same line such as the sound of /o/ in “A child’s foot doesn’t know it’s a foot yet”, /a/ in “And it wants to be a butterfly or an apple” and the sound of /e/ in “Then the child’s foot / was defeated, it fell.”
- Consonance: Consonance is the repetition of consonant sounds in the same line such as the sound of /th/ and /s/ in “But then the rocks and pieces of glass”, /k/ and /f/ in “keep teaching the foot that it can’t fly,” and the sound of /l/ and /t/ in “Little by little without light.”
- Enjambment: It is defined as a thought in verse that does not come to an end at a line break; rather, it rolls over to the next line. For example;
Those smooth toe nails
of quartz in a bunch,
got harder, they changed into
an opaque substance, into hard horn
and the child’s little petals.
- Imagery: Imagery is used to make readers perceive things involving their five senses. The poem shows the use of imagery such as “But this blind thing kept going”, “this foot worked with its shoes” and “because there everything was dark.”
- Metaphor: It is a figure of speech in which an implied comparison is made between the objects that are different. The poem shows the beautiful metaphor of the foot of a child and its lifecycle. Some other metaphors are such as butterfly as the foot is compared to it.
- Personification: The poet has also personified the foot, showing it has life and emotions of its own.
- Symbolism: Symbolism is using symbols to signify ideas and qualities, giving them symbolic meanings that are different from literal meanings. The poem shows the use of the symbols such as rocks, pieces of glass, the streets, and the stairways to show obstacles that a man encounters in life.
- Simile: The poem shows the use of personification such as: exploring life like a blind man.
Analysis of Poetic Devices Used in “To The Foot From Its Child”
Poetic and literary devices are the same, but a few are used only in poetry. Here is the analysis of some of the poetic devices used in this poem.
- Diction and Tone: The poem shows the use of simple diction. Its tone, however, is funny as well as serious and tragic by the end.
- Free Verse: The poem does not follow any rhyme scheme. Therefore, it is a free verse poem.
- Stanza: A stanza is a poetic form of some lines. There are four stanzas having a different number of verses.
Quotes to be Used
These lines from “To The Foot From Its Child” are relevant to quote when talking about the life cycle and the final destiny – the death.
And then it went down
into the earth and didn’t know anything
because there everything was dark.
