Speaker In The Poem example essay topic

405 words
The transition from girlhood to womanhood is commonly one of the hardest times in a girls life, but more often by society it is overlooked as being a minor change. In the poem "Quinceanera" by Judith Ortiz Cover, the speaker, who is a young girl, explains the changes she must go through at the age of fifteen. From simple things, such as giving up possessions to actually being accustomed to doing things in preparation for marriage, the speaker describes first hand the many difficulties of becoming a woman. But because women are often perceived as the inferior race in society, the speaker in the poem is resistant to the changes she must go thorough.

The poem best describes the double standard that exists between men and women in this specific crucial time of change. Women are often frustrated by the inability of men to understand the complexity of all the changes that occur as a girl blossoms into a woman. The speaker most clearly explains her anger when she says "the fluids of my body were poison, as if the little trickle of blood I believe travels from my heart to the world were shameful" (13-15). The general public tends to think that a woman getting her period is something repulsive, when in fact it represents a transition into becoming a woman. The author writes "is not the blood of saints and men in battle beautiful?

Do Christ's hands not bleed into your eyes from His cross?" (16-18). The speaker is basically emphasizing that blood is blood regardless of who it comes from. The truth is that men are rewarded for the blood they shed to save lives, but how about the blood that women Zhublawar, 5 shed in order to bring life? The irony is that men and women are considered to be equals, but a woman gets no recognition for the daily hardships she faces. The point being that the human race puts out a double standard for men and women.

The only way that she can escape from this horror is through time, and perhaps the only way she can truly escape is when she is no longer living. The tragedy of all of this is that in some cultures this double standard still exists and the young women wait "for the hours to release [them]" (24)..