{"id":655,"date":"2022-09-14T13:54:04","date_gmt":"2022-09-14T17:54:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqlit\/?p=655"},"modified":"2022-09-14T13:54:04","modified_gmt":"2022-09-14T17:54:04","slug":"jones-relationship-with-his-inner-child-in-insomniac","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqlit\/2022\/09\/14\/jones-relationship-with-his-inner-child-in-insomniac\/","title":{"rendered":"Jones’ relationship with his inner child in “Insomniac”"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cInsomniac\u201d is about Saeed Jones\u2019 broken\u00a0relationship with his inner child. The reason why I know the boy Jones describes is him is because his reference to\u00a0\u2018legs\u2019 in the first stanza of this poem parallels the several references made about\u00a0legs in his other poems about later life experiences. In \u201cInsomniac\u201d Jones describes the\u00a0young boy (himself as a child) as \u201csmall with wild legs\u201d (1). In \u201cCruel Body\u201d\u00a0about Jones\u2019 experience with sexual assault, it says \u201cGet up. Find your legs, leave\u201d (35). There is a clear difference\u00a0between the two characters, the young boy who cannot sit still and the older person who cannot leave. <\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The relationship between the two characters, the two versions of Jones, is described as an estranged relationship between child and parent, which supports the idea about Jones lamenting over his inner child.\u00a0The newer version of Jones is described as the \u201c<\/span>mother of sorrows<\/span><\/i>\u201d who cries in the child\u2019s bed and waits for him to answer her calls (1). <\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Even though the two people come from the same \u2018family\u2019 Jones says, \u201cthe only inheritance of worth [the inner child\u2019s] in the village of your synapses\u201d (1). This line suggests that the relationship between parent and son- Jones and his inner child- is not only sad but dysfunctional as well; the inheritance was not intended for the child but for\u00a0Jones\u2019 older self. I think this makes sense because children seem to have more self-worth in general until it gets robbed from them in\u00a0life experiences. <\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

It is not until the last stanza where Jones accepts fault for this relationship when it says<\/span> \u201cbut \u2014 for now\u2014he’s still your boy. Sweet little wreck. Check the room you\u2019ve locked him in\u201d (1). The reader stops focusing on how the boy was \u2018trapped in his synapses\u2019 but how he got trapped there to begin with. <\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cInsomniac\u201d is about Saeed Jones\u2019 broken\u00a0relationship with his inner child. The reason why I know the boy Jones describes is him is because his reference to\u00a0\u2018legs\u2019 in the first stanza of this poem parallels the several references made about\u00a0legs in his other poems about later life experiences. In \u201cInsomniac\u201d Jones describes the\u00a0young boy (himself as … Continue reading Jones’ relationship with his inner child in “Insomniac”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4999,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[344620],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-655","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fall-2022"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/655","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4999"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=655"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/655\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=655"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=655"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=655"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}