Analysis of Fifteen to Eighteen from Marilyn Hacker’s Selected Poems :: Hacker Selected Poems 1965-1990

Analysis of fifteen to Eighteen from Marilyn Hackers Selected PoemsIn the poem Fifteen to Eighteen, Marilyn Hacker uses the unmanageable years of adolescence to analyze the effects an illness can have on the relationship and family roles for both p bent and child. Diabetes puts the bugger off and little daughter in enemy roles than are traditionally seen at this age. The illness which occurs at least oer the last four years of this girls childhood forces her to grow up prematurely, get into on some of the mother roles, and suffer the sacrifices that accompany it. Jessie Potter in Judith Viorsts book My Mother My Self discusses the impact that motherhood has on sex activity of the mother. The mother may have been an interesting sexual partner until her child was born, notwithstanding now she is too tired, too busy, she says the children coin up too much of her attention. Its all culturally induced, but the result is that the mother goes underground sexually until the kids ar e grown.(59) Just as the role of motherhood often leads to giving up sexuality for a period of time, this daughter more immediately gives up masturbating to deal with her child of the hour. As the mother becomes the one who needs to be bring offd for, the daughter is forced, just as mothers usually are to give up their private needs and desires when they become mothers. These sacrifices are not healthy for the mothers, nor is it healthy for this teenager to be in this position of responsibility at such an earlyish age. The poem leaves the reader wondering what will happen after the girl is eighteen, who will care for the mother? When the daughter leaves home, she will most seeming feel guilty for leaving her mother who can not care for herself. This guilt is similar too to that which so often accompanies parenting. The physical fleck and swearing in the poem are present as a way of showing how this girl is being forced from her childhood and thrown and twisted into adulthood a nd motherhood. I was in shock again. I swam/to my surface to take care of my mother.(144) The liquid which is spilled during the evening is symbolic of the death of the daughters adolescence, which reoccurs during each episode. more often, enough orange juice got down,/splashed on us both(144) And just as the daughter is totally in the role of caretaker, the mother snaps back and is once again in role of mother care for her daughter, concerned about the scratches on her daughters face.