Carl Sandburg

Never Born

Never Born - meaning Summary

Grief Rendered as Silence

The short poem confronts the aftermath of an irretrievable loss, evoking grief and stunned disbelief. The speaker states that a child is dead and never born, then asks why life should continue or even start again. Rhetorical questions and the image of ashes laughing at ashes convey the futility of trying to reverse time and the bleak, paradoxical sense that efforts to cope may seem absurd and mocked by fate.

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THE TIME has gone by. The child is dead. The child was never even born. Why go on? Why so much as begin? How can we turn the clock back now And not laugh at each other As ashes laugh at ashes?

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