Children
Children are the ultimate symbol of innocence throughout the works of this poet. The symbolism goes deeper than mere sexual innocence. They represent a full-scale lack of awareness about all the corrupting influences in the adult world.
Boats
Boats only show up in a select minority of the poems. Nevertheless, the ship is one of the significant symbols in the entire work. Vessels appear in various states that reflect the journey of life. The first mention has the speaker preparing to launch. In another, the only passengers are the speaker and god. In another, the symbolism of children as innocence is conveyed with the imagery of children floating without care over the ocean's deepest waters. Collectively, boats come to symbolize the journey through life.
Water
A boat is useless without water to sail upon, of course. Water appears under a variety of terms: the sea. the river, the ocean, etc. In one poem, the sea represents the dangers of experience threatening the innocence of children oblivious to its menace. In another, the ocean is directly implicated as being the cradle of life from birth to death. Throughout, water is synonymous with life and living. This is why the boat so impactfully symbolizes the journey through it.
Flowers
Flower imagery appears throughout the poems comprising this collection. Although presented in various ways, the symbolism is permanently attached in some way to their cyclical nature. The impermanence of flowers symbolizes both the briefness of human life and the possibility of rebirth and regrowth.
Wedding
Arguably, the most unexpected and surprising use of symbolism in this work is the representation of death through the imagery of a wedding. This symbolism is only directly engaged in two poems, 91 and 94. The former opens with a song offering welcoming death and ends with the image of the bride "meeting her lord alone." Song 94 has the speaker putting on a "wedding garland" without fear of what awaits. It is a minor symbol, but weddings are clearly—if ironically—situated as symbols of death.
