Relationship In The Poem example essay topic

Judith Minty, Marge Piercy, and Judith Viorst are all authors of poems about women in romantic relationships and, how the women are depicted in these relationships. These authors seem to depict women through their works as dependent, weak and helpless beings. Minty and Piercy tend to use metaphors along with imagery and personification, in order to convey the emotion of the women characters. In contrast Viorst uses Anaphora and has a different way of describing the couple in her poem. Granted these poems were written in the 1930's, times have changed and so have the women. Judith Minty, author of Conjoined writes about a woman in her kitchen comparing an onion with the relationship she and her husband have.

The tone of the poem is negative; as one might gather if a relationship in the poem is being compared to an onion. Minty uses descriptions such as: " a two headed monster, deformed, an accident, ... fighting to suck at it's mothers teats, freaks, doomed to live" (Roberts, pp. 790). She continually uses negative images to describe this onion, the "two headed monster" (Roberts, pp. 790), which represents her and her husband in a very negative manner. "Two joined under one transparent skin", then she asks her husband "do you feel the skin that binds us together as we move, heavy in this house?" (Roberts, pp. 791) The use of such images in this poem may lead one to believe she feels trapped and unhappy in the relationship. The overall tone of this poem depicts women as slaves rather than companions; implying that a woman's place is in the kitchen "Ah but men don't slice onions in the kitchen, seldom see what is invisible". (Roberts, pp. 790) Marge Piercy author of A Work of Artifice, writes about a young bonsai tree that collapsed when lightning struck it, "on the side of a mountain till split by lighting".

(Roberts, pp. 792) A man then picks up the tree and brings it home. The man raises the tree. He keeps clipping and binding the tree so that it will grow to be only nine inches tall. This tree has the potential of growing up to 80 feet.

The poem then shifts to talk about how women had been "pruned" (Roberts, pp. 792), by "binding their feet, curling their hair and somehow crippling their mind". (Roberts, pp. 792) Much like when women could not vote, get an education or even have an every day job. Women were made to think or persuaded to think that they were the smaller and weaker being. This poem although about a tree very clearly defines the role of many women in the 1930's as well as today. Women were indirectly described as being raised by men; raised to assume the role that society defined them as, weather it be to stay small, weak and pretty, or to be a stay home wife while the man remains the breadwinner. Judith Viorst, author of True Love.

Viorst writes about a woman in a marriage, being opposed to speaking of the marriage as a burden or bondage, she makes it seem like it is a healthy relationship, one where both she as well as her husband sacrifice for each other. Her poem is slightly different from the two previously talked about. Viorst talks about looking physically attractive "even when there's no one here but him" (Roberts, pp. 1008). The poem goes on to talk about her sacrificing, by watching football even though she despises it. The question being asked throughout the poem is "Is it true love because?" (Roberts, pp. 1008) The poem is different from the others not only because of the somewhat positive or humorous tone, but because the relationship described seems to be that of an equal one. "The husband understands that his wife hates him when he left her at home with the baby, the painter and the exterminator.

Then she understood that he hated her, when the stock she told him not to buy went up twenty-six points". (Roberts, pp. 1009) These poems all clearly define the roles women played in relationships in the 1930's and of course today and the way their roles have changed However since then women have come a long way as in Minty's poem Conjoined. Today if a woman felt that trapped or miserable in a relationship she could leave her husband by means of separation or divorce. In Piercy's A Work of Artifice the woman was suppressed, women are no longer suppressed at least not to the extent of binding feet and corsets.

Today women feel free to attend a university and study in fields such as: law, architecture and engineering these were not, until recently, predominately male fields. Women have certainly come a long way since 1930. However, not all relationships were one sided in the 1930's as Viorst suggested in True Love. Her couple is happy and equal. It demonstrates how real relationships work, that is, they are give and take. The poem even says that when things like physical attraction fade all a couple has left is love.

And that is what 'true love' is. Viorst says it best: "Despite cigarette cough, tooth decay, acid indigestion, dandruff, and other features of married life that tend to dampen the fires of passion, We can still feel something We can call True love". (Roberts, pp. 1009) This is a great example of the positive tone used by Viorst. Women have since been exposed to 'the mans world' it is now imperative that women go to school and become capable of supporting themselves.

Women today have issues that women in the 1930's would have never thought about. I believe these authors are all glad women have come as far as they have. Although only a few decades have past times did change along with women.