Analysis of Refugee mother and Child

The title of the poem gives off the initial impression that the poem may focus on refugees: one who flees to seek refuge, The lives of refugee children, their parents, their feelings, their emotions and their pain. 'For a son she soon would have to forget'. This foreshadows the idea that her son is dying, and she would have to forget him to adapt to her tragic loss. 2 The metaphor in the fist stanza, 'No …

…is no longer alive. This action is explained in a simile and compares her parting his thinning hair to laying flowers on a tiny grave - another link to the possible idea that the son is already dead. The mother is gently parting her son's hair as a way to say goodbye, since he has passed on - just like another form of saying good bye, placing flowers on a grave starting closure and acceptance.