Essayn on A Little Girl Tugs at the Tablecloth Poem: Imagination vs. Reality

This poem is mainly speaking about curiosity. It talks about the desire to know, explore and understand. It brings out the unique nature that every individual has of wanting to make sense of things on their own. Everyone has that desire to experience through quenching their curiosity for many issues and aspects in life that happen to us when we are very innocent of them. The speaker has clearly brought this out through showing the contrast between imagination and reality; innocence and experience. The speaker uses a little girl who is only one year old and is alone at home in a room surrounded by a lot she does not understand. Thus she develops a deep curiosity to understand, and because she is young with no experience, she only has her imagination to rely on. Her naive and innocent imagination is the center of this poem. The writer uses this to show therefore that, one, the experience is important in order to make sound decisions and two; it is okay and well understandable to sometimes be innocent since you could be a one-year-old to such. Further, the naivety of the little girl to the now- moving things will they roam across the ceiling? Fly around the lamp? Hop onto the windowsill and from there to a tree? (Lines (20, (21, 22) - brings out a ridicule aspect to Newtons work and thus the speaker uses sarcasm to make fun of Isaac Newton, Mr. Newton has no say in this (23).

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The girl imagines how if she could help these motionless things by making them move they would make beautiful motions of their own. She imagines that they must be very helpless they need to be helped along, shoved, shifted, taken from their place and relocated (6) because they cannot move by themselves. She imagines how difficult it must be for them to stay at one place. The speaker brings out clearly how the little girls imagination runs wildly through her mind. She even concludes out of her imagination that these items must be playing stubborn But the tablecloth on the stubborn table (11). This the little girl concludes in her imagination because the table cloth is willing to be stretched in order to fit the table and yet the table has assumed no role so far. She thinks they are lazy, proud and naughty that they must be made to make an effort. As such she decides to make the first move. The speaker is intrigued by how the girl thinks that after shaking the table, the things will reciprocate willingly and make happy intentional beautiful motions. It is amusing just how her imagination is honest and justified, like that of a child. On the other hand, the reality of her shaking the table could result in those things falling, some breaking thus causing damage and loss. Here the speaker is trying to prove how different imagination and reality really is. In imagination, there are no damages, or rather no risks to be incurred, in reality, however, all risks have to be considered before any action.

We see the girl finally making up her mind. She decides to resolve this conflicting issue on her mind and make these stubborn things move.She really wants to know how they move! Its fascinating, what form of motion will they take, once they are on the brink? (17,18,19). These lines show her strong curious mind. She honestly thinks that when she moves the glasses or the plates, or the spoons, they will fly around or move around a tree. The speaker emphasizes with the girls innocent imagination, naivety and lack of knowledge, experience, and understanding. However, at her age, it is expected. And this justifies her innocent imagination. Unfortunately, as she grows up this innocence will be rubbed off by the truth of the reality. Soon, she will gain experience and know that the plates do not refuse to move and the table is not stubborn and if she makes the table, they will break and not dance around the lamp. Her innocence will be replaced by truth and reality which in one word can be termed as experience. She will understand that information helps us stay informed and empowered.

Sometimes just like the little girl we like being in control of our lives; our empires, we do things as in order to satisfy our desires and gratifications. In such times, we tend not to bother with the reality of the result, just like the little girl didn't knows shaking the table could break the glasses and plates. We, therefore, end up harming our lives because of making uninformed decisions. It is wise to always remember that information and knowledge protects us from making wrong decisions and moves that will end up destroying our lives. Further, through experience, we are able to understand the extent of the harm of a wrong decision both emotionally and physically. Fortunately, this is the common, general and the obvious learning process. We all start by being innocent and progress in growth through experience.

In conclusion, we learn from the speaker that at some point, we are all toddlers in the universe we live in. sometimes we might be alone and naive and find ourselves living in a world of imagination since we do not know what the reality is. Other times, we struggle to be in control of what we do not know or understand. It is, therefore, good to know that, depending on where we are in life, there are many things we are innocent of and maybe we are trying to make them shake not knowing that shaking will break them. The point is it is right for them not to move sometimes. We are naive not to know that if we insist on making them move, there will be more harm done than good. The good news, however, is we grow and are no more toddlers, we get exposed and as such we learn, that we can only lift, or shift in order for the move to be perfect and result in positive.