whatwishes doesthechild in the poem make? why doesthe child want to be a hawker, a gardener, or a watchman? pick out the lines in each stanza, which tell us this
The child in the poem wants to be a hawker, a gardener, and a watchman. When he looks at the hawker, he wishes he could also spend his day on the road crying “Bangles, crystal bangles!” He feels that there is nothing to hurry the hawker on. There is no road he must take, no place he must go to, and no fixed time when he must come home. These are the things that he cannot do himself and therefore, he wants to be a hawker so that he could do all these things. Next, he wishes he was a gardener because a gardener does what he likes with his spade. He soils his clothes with dust. Nobody scolds him if he gets baked in the sun or gets wet. Therefore, if the little child was a gardener, nobody would stop him from digging. Finally, he sees the watchman and wants to be like the watchman so that he could walk through dark and lonely streets all night with his lantern and chase shadows. When he is put to bed and is not allowed to roam outside, he sees the watchman swinging his lantern with his shadow at his side and he feels that the watchman never even once has to go to bed in his entire life. Therefore, he wants to be a hawker, a gardener, and a watchman so that he could do all the things they did as he could not do them being a child.