In lines 5 and 6, the speaker already has reached a conclusion based on evidence that is hidden Media Adaptations This person could be the speaker’s father, or it could refer to the cultural concept of a male god, who is distant and unaware of her plight. In the second line, the speaker introduces a second unidentified person, who tells the speaker “the same thing / as that one, / asleep, upstairs.” Here, a third unidentified person is mentioned. The fact that it “flares” by itself may suggest a flare-up of anger, or it may foreshadow self-enlightenment, or it may suggest something ominous in this scene. But this is “on the table,” so even if it is intended to be used outside, this lamp is inside. The green lamp could be a camping lantern-something one takes to illuminate the darkness of the natural world. Poem Summary Line 1Īt first glance, this opening line seems to be a simple, declarative sentence, but the images suggest several other possibilities. Our lives will be the same- your lips, swollen from whistling at danger, and I a stranger in this desert, nursing the tough skin of figs. He had a goatee-he had your face, though I didn’t know it. As a child, I fell in love with a Japanese woodcut of a girl gazing at the moon. Now I see: the possibilities are like golden dresses in a nutshell. You tell me the same thing as that one, asleep, upstairs.
Poem Text The green lamp flares on the table. Dove lives with her husband and daughter in Charlottesville, Virginia, where she is Professor of English at the University of Virginia Commonwealth. Mellon Foundation, Dove holds the distinction of having been the first African American, as well as the youngest individual, to hold the post of United States Poet Laureate, a position she held from 1993 to 1995. In addition to her other achievements, which include fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Guggenheim Foundation, and the Andrew W. There she met her husband, the German-born writer and journalist Fred Viebahn. This led to further studies at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. The following year, Dove studied at West Germany’s Tubingen University as a Fulbright scholar. She earned a bachelor’s degree from Miami University of Ohio in 1973-where she had enrolled as a National Achievement Scholar-and graduated summa cum laude. An excellent student, Dove was invited to the White House in 1970 as a Presidential Scholar, ranking nationally among the best high school students of the graduating class of that year. Dove, the first African-American chemist to break the racial barrier in the tire and rubber industry, and the former Elvira Elizabeth Hord. Author Biographyīorn in 1952 in Akron, Ohio, to well-educated parents, Dove is the daughter of Ray A. More abundant than this desert, which only produces nuts and figs with tough skins. The rest of the passage may be a reference to her father or to the cultural concept of a male god, who is “asleep, upstairs.” Either way, the meaning is the same-the reality of this life can never measure up to her fantasy of a world of possibilities In the first stanza, the speaker addresses an unidentified second person when she says, “You tell me the same thing / as that one, / asleep, upstairs.” Later, the speaker reveals that this “you” is her lover or husband. This poem may also be portraying the difficulty of being a woman, with certain emotional and romantic needs, as symbolized by the image of the moon, in a society dominated by men.
#Adolescence rita dove skin
The speaker sees that “the possibilities” in this life may be impossible, “like golden dresses in a nutshell.” As a child, the speaker relates, she “fell in love / with a Japanese woodcut / of a girl gazing at the moon.” Further, the speaker confesses, “I waited with her for her lover.” Her identification with the imaginary girl is so complete that even now, in this life, the speaker associates the imaginary lover with her present lover: “he had / your face, though I didn’t know it.” Finally, the speaker concludes that her life and her lover’s “will be the same,” and that she will remain “a stranger in this desert,” this life, though she will continue to try to attain the impossible, “nursing the tough skin of figs.” “This Life,” like several other poems in the same collection, grapples with the problem of fantasy versus reality.
This poem was published in Dove’s first complete book of poems, The Yellow House on the Corner, in 1980.
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