We Are Seven (Summary and Themes)

 

The English poet William Wordsworth wrote and published “We Are Seven” in 1798. This poem first appeared in Lyrical Ballads, a poetry collection that contains works by both Wordsworth and his friend and collaborator Samuel Taylor Coleridge. While it was originally published anonymously, Lyrical Ballads was highly influential and is now widely considered the springboard for British Romanticism. Indeed, the speaker of “We Are Seven” debates a young girl who believes that her two deceased siblings should be counted among her family members, staging a battle between and emotion and logic that is typical of Romantic concerns. The speaker and the child never reach an agreement, leaving behind additional questions about the nature of death and the power of familial bonds.

“We Are Seven” Summary

The speaker wonders what a sweet, living, breathing child, who is totally full of vitality, might know about death.

The speaker explains that he once met a little girl who lived in the countryside. She was eight years old and had thick, curly hair.

The child’s appearance reflected her rural upbringing and was somewhat disheveled. She had very lovely eyes and her beauty charmed the speaker.

The speaker asked the little girl how many children were in her family. She replied that there were seven children in total and looked at the speaker curiously.

He then asked the little girl to tell him where all these children lived. The girl explained that, of the seven children, two lived in Conway (in the UK) and two were away at sea.

The girl then clarified that two additional siblings—one brother and one sister—were buried in the churchyard, and that she and her mother lived in a nearby cottage.

Confused, the speaker asked the sweet little girl to explain how there could be seven children in her family if she only had two siblings who live in Conway and two who were at sea.

The little girl repeated that there were, in fact, seven children in her family, because two of them were lying beneath a tree in the churchyard.

The speaker retorted that the little girl herself was able to run all around because she was alive, so if two of her siblings were lying in the churchyard cemetery, there were really only five children in her family.

The little girl noted that new plant life sprouted from her siblings' graves. Moreover, she could see and visit them, as her brother and sister were buried side-by-side just steps away from the cottage that she shared with her mother.

The girl then described how she liked to spend time with her deceased siblings—knitting, sewing her handkerchief, and singing them songs as she sat on the ground by their graves.

She went on to explain that when it was nice outside after sunset, she would often take a small bowl out to the churchyard and eat her supper by their graves.

The child then told the speaker that her sister, Jane, was the first to die. Jane had been sick and laid in bed, crying in pain, until God took her out of her misery and she left.

As such, Jane was buried in the churchyard, and the little girl and her brother, John, would play by her grave when the weather allowed.

But one winter, when the ground was covered in slippery, white snow that little girl could play in, John also passed away and was buried next to Jane.

When the child finished her story, the speaker again asked how many siblings she had, given that Jane and John had gone to heaven. The little girl quickly responded that there were seven children in her family.

The speaker exclaimed that her brother and sister were dead, reiterating that their spirits had gone to heaven. At this point, the speaker felt that he was wasting his words, as the little girl would never stop insisting that there were indeed seven children in her family.

“We Are Seven” Themes

Childhood Innocence vs. Adult Understanding

The speaker of “We Are Seven” recalls a conversation with a young girl who insists that there are seven children in her family, despite the fact that two of them have passed away. The speaker insists that, logically, there are now only five children in her family, and portrays the little girl as unable to fully comprehend death. In doing so, the speaker suggests that childhood innocence gives rise to a blissful yet limited understanding of the world, while adults are left to grapple with life’s harsh realities.

The speaker relies on hard knowledge and evidence to argue that the girl is one of five siblings. He repeatedly cites numbers and encourages the girl to count her siblings multiple times. The speaker also contrasts the girl's physical liveliness with her siblings’ stillness in death, saying, “You run about, my little Maid, / Your limbs they are alive.” Here, the speaker takes a scientific approach, again relying on his adult knowledge and worldly experience—things the innocent little girl does not possess—in order to make his point.

The speaker also takes care to exaggerate the girl's youth in order to undermine her own take on her family. He introduces her as “a simple Child” and refers to her as “it.” He is quick to point out that “she [is] eight years old” and suggests that her youthfulness discredits her perspective on death, posing the question, “What should it know of death?” The speaker goes on to call her “little Maid” throughout the poem (while he is “Sir” and “Master”), again calling attention to their age disparity as the root of her perceived ignorance; that is, the speaker sees her youthful innocence as making her unable to grasp the reality of the world. She may be happy, but, in the speaker's mind, she is also simply wrong about the way the world works.

The speaker thus repeatedly brushes off her logic, implying that it isn’t credible even as the girl spends a great deal of time explaining all the ways that she continues to interact with her deceased siblings’ memories. She also points out that her siblings are buried nearby, just “twelve steps or more from [her] mother’s door,” implying how close she feels to them even in death. Yet the speaker simply restates his earlier points, disregarding her reasoning.

The child is equally persistent, but the speaker suggests that she is simply blind to the truth. As the poem draws to a close, he mentions that trying to explain death to the child is like “throwing words away.” To put it differently, the speaker decides that she, as an innocent child, is simply incapable of following his logic.

While both characters are certain about their conclusions, the speaker makes clear that his perspective is based in facts and figures, while hers results from a lack of experience. Still, they never reach an agreement and their conversation apparently haunts the speaker long after its conclusion. As such, the reader is left to determine for themselves whether the acceptance of difficult truths in adulthood is necessarily more favorable than an innocent, blissful worldview.

The Nature of Death

The speaker stands by his understanding of death as something that definitively severs people from life. The young girl, on the other hand, proposes that death is the transformation of life rather than its loss—that it is part of a larger natural cycle and, as such, that the dead remain closely connected to the living world. These two perspectives are held in tension throughout the poem, without a clear resolution as to the nature of death and what death means for those left behind.

The speaker maintains that death definitively breaks one’s ties with the living. Thus, when the girl remarks that there are seven children in her family, the speaker disagrees. He counts only her living siblings and asks her to explain how there can be seven children in her family.

The girl goes on to explain that they are buried nearby and that she regularly spends time by their graves. The speaker remains incredulous, however, insisting, “those two are dead! / Their spirits are in heaven!” The speaker believes that when people die, they are fundamentally cut off from the living, regardless of physical closeness or emotional connection; death is inherently incompatible with life, and the dead basically cease to exist.

The girl pushes back against this idea, however, instead seeing death as a kind of transformative experience. Although her siblings have passed away, the girl still feels a strong kinship with them because they are buried just steps from her home. Indeed, she visits them “often” to play games and sing to them. The girl, then, sees her siblings as integrated with her daily life—extensions of her household—and in doing so blurs the line between life and death.

The girl's consistent use of the present tense further reflects the fact that she sees each of her siblings as an active presence in the living world. For instance, she says her deceased brother and sister “in the church-yard lie." And although the girl “feels [...] life in every limb,” she refers to herself in the same terms as her deceased brother and sister, remarking, “We are seven.”

The girl also imagines death as a removal of pain or an insertion of distance rather than as some severing event. Recounting her sister’s death, she says, “God released her of her pain,” and both of her deceased siblings are said to have simply gone “away.”

Finally, the girl uses natural imagery to present her siblings’ death as one phase within a larger life cycle, furthering the idea that death is a transformation of life and not its loss. In particular, she points out that her brother died in winter, a difficult time for many species that is associated with dormancy and death. Yet she also explains that there are still seven children in her family because “[her siblings’] graves are green.” New grass can be interpreted as a sign of springtime and new life. All this subtly suggests that death is one stage within the circle of life—an element within a larger, ongoing natural cycle, much like the seasons that continuously fade into one another.

Ultimately the girl's account of her siblings’ ongoing presence suggests that death is a central part of life and should be treated as such. This perspective challenges the conventional views of the speaker, who contends that death is the loss of life—a total severance from the living. Their differences are never resolved, leaving the reader to consider the question for themselves.

Family Bonds

Despite pressure from the speaker to say otherwise, the young girl insists that her deceased siblings are still members of her family. The fact that she maintains a strong relationship with her siblings, even after they have passed away, suggests that familial bonds have lasting power.

The girl maintains a close connection with her deceased brother and sister, who remain central to her everyday life and sense of self. The girl visits them at the church-yard where they are buried and integrates their memories with her day-to-day activities. For instance, she “often” does her knitting and sewing while sitting by their graves. She will even sing to her siblings and eat dinner beside them, clearly still feeling connected to them even in death.

The girl also refers to herself and her siblings as a group, repeatedly using “we” and “us.” Such collective language indicates that she sees herself as part of a larger family unit, which persists even in death. In fact, she uses the same language to describe all of her siblings, living and dead alike. She says to the speaker, "And two of us at Conway dwell, / And two are gone to sea. // Two of us in the church-yard lie." As such, the speaker portrays her departed brother and sister as equally present in her life as her surviving siblings are.

Finally, the girl points out the closeness between other members of her family. She twice refers to the fact that her brother and sister lie “side by side,” and she even describes playing at her sister’s grave with her brother. She also repeatedly mentions that they are buried just steps away from her mother’s home. The girl emphasizes the connections between various members of her family, illustrating that familial bonds remain strong after a member dies.

The girl never caves to the speaker’s claims that she is one of five children, because that is simply not her reality. The child feels, believes, and behaves as if she is one of seven. In this way, she suggests that families share unbreakable bonds that are central to one’s identity.