Faces along the bar
Cling to their average day:
The lights must never go out,
The music must always play,
All the conventions conspire
To make this fort assume
The furniture of home;
Lest we should see where we are,
Lost in a haunted wood,
Children afraid of the night
Who have never been happy or good.
To me, this poem symbolizes our reluctance to leave or look outside our comfort zone. Everyone has an area, state of living, anything in which they feel safe, secure, and comfortable. When something comes along that shakes them from this position, their world falls apart. This is what I feel Auden is describing in this stanza of his poem.
The rhyme between "day" and "play" connect the two concepts of safety and familiarity. Then the rhyme in the last three lines, "wood" and "good", connect the lostness of a shaken viewpoint to the wrongs of those who dwelled in comfort.
This stanza brings to light Auden's feelings toward the America to which he came during WWII. He saw how the Americans enjoyed their way of life and lived a life of relative comfort while parts of the world experienced pain and suffering.
This particular stanza of Auden's poem is quite enthralling and evocative. I appreciate your insights connecting the shaken viewpoint with the wrongs of those who dwell in comfort, as well as the idea of the rift between those who know comfort and those who suffer.
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