The Blossom

The infant in the poem is at the mother's breast but most likely it was a nurse's breast; the sparrow represents the child's happiness while the robin represents desolation as robins traditionally appear during the winter, one could assume[citation needed] that it is upset at having missed the exciting, lively critiques that occur with summer – such as blossoms.

Thus, Blake wrote in Songs of Innocence about how the parish sent foundling children to the country to be cared for by nurses—foster mothers.

The sparrow, seeking his cradle "swift as an arrow", has been interpreted in a phallic sense, and demonstrates the innocence and joy of free love.

Many of his poems, such as "The Little Girl Lost" and "Found", "The Lilly" or "The Angel", also follow this theme of giving in to desires and sexual love.

Scholars agree that "The Blossom" is the 11th object in the order of the original printings of the Songs of Innocence and of Experience.