Edwards Hirsch's Poem For Sleepwalkers

Edwards Hirsch’s poem “For the Sleepwalkers” focuses on the author’s admiration of sleepwalkers and their ability to trust their bodies in a state of complete unconsciousness; this praise, however, furthermore establishes a metaphor for the lesson Hirsch intends to portray to readers. He insists that we must become vulnerable like sleepwalkers and trust in our own hearts as they trust their bodies out of the control of their consciousnesses. The author also highlights the idea of keeping our hearts unguarded, connecting back to the necessity of trusting ourselves to remain this exposed, similar to how sleepwalkers fully trust in their bodies despite their vulnerable and senseless state. Ultimately , Hirsch reveals this underlying metaphor throughout the poem using the unconsciousness and vulnerability of sleepwalkers to emphasize the necessity of trusting in oneself and learning to develop a fervent faith in our own hearts. …show more content…
Additionally, the poem consists of three line stanzas symbolizing the Holy Trinity which thereby convey the intense faith of dedicated followers of a religion. The ideas of faith and religion embedded in Hirsch’s admiration of sleepwalkers -- as seen in the author’s use of specific diction and form of the poem -- begin to establish the underlying metaphor for the sleepwalkers in relation to how we trust in our own hearts. Hirsch displays his fascination with the ultimate faith sleepwalkers have in their bodies to guide themselves, setting the basis of the metaphor of having the “desperate faith” in our own hearts that sleepwalkers in their own