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While visiting his sister, Phoebe, asks Holden what he wanted to do in life. Holden had some trouble with this question, but then brought up the poem, “Coming ‘Thro’ the Rye” by Robert Burns. In thinking about this poem Holden pictured little kids playing in a field of rye, all alone by themselves, no one around to tell them what they can or can’t do. Holden’s responsibility would be catching the children when they start falling over the cliff. This was how Holden interpreted the poem, but his understanding was completely wrong as he replaced the word “meeting” with the words “catching” and “falling.” Through his interpretation, Holden is trying to catch the children meaning he wants to maintain the innocence these children hold. If Holden doesn’t catch the children and just let them fall, he would allow them to die and abandon their innocence, as through the emergence of adulthood. Holden wants to do this, as he himself is struggling with the same predicament the children face. He wants to keep catching himself instead of falling, because he wants to preserve what little or any innocence he has. Experiencing the cruel world around him, Holden doesn’t want the children to feel the same pain he has dealt with, as he grows older, away from innocence. Holden has encountered and…show more content… Holden sees this word on various occasions as in the hallways when he goes to visit Phoebe at school and when he goes to visit a museum he used to go to. These places represented something good and happy within Holden’s life because they brought him back to his childhood. Holden’s struggle of moving away from childhood and towards adulthood is exemplified through the use “f-word” and it shows how even the things Holden once loved have started to become wrong and corrupt. Holden not able to conform and fit into the ever so changing world around him is represented by the use of this