Loves Evolution In Marriage - Essay Example

Love’s Evolution In Marriage In several poems, Emily Dickinson explores the complexity of marriage and love. She Rose to His Requirement is a poem that depicts the loss of liberty and control of women over their lives for marriage. Tell All The Truth concerns telling the truth in slanted ways, which can also be related to the truth of women’s conditions and experiences that cannot be directly exposed. If You Were Coming in the Fall talks about missing loved ones and the suffering that time inflicts on the person who waits for their return. Ezra Pound, in River-Merchant’s Wife, stands for the growing love between strangers. It is a monologue of a sixteen-year-old wife to her husband. This essay analyzes which of Dickinson's poems affects Pound's poem the greatest. Dickinson’s She Rose to His Requirement informs Pound’s River-Merchant’s Wife the greatest because the former poem captures the essence of marriage as a patriarchal convention, but where love can also emerge and develop. The beginning of the River-Merchant’s Wife sends the image of urgency and continuation of womanhood, which can also be sensed from She Rose to His Requirement. Dickinson says in the first life: “She rose to His Requirement – drop." Women rise to the demands of men, mostly through marriage. The last word "drop" signals how this must be done in an abrupt manner. The first line of River-Merchant’s Wife also begins with the feeling of youth that suddenly ends: "While my hair was still cut straight across my forehead.” The word “while” emphasizes the image of the speaker as a young girl. The second line starts with the word “I” and signifies the image of a playing girl who meets her future husband. She has not yet learned how she must drop her activities as a wife, which is the center of marriage for Dickinson. Nevertheless, the first stanza of Pound’s poem describes the process of changing for women. The future husband introduces himself into the girl’s life the form of playing with “bamboo stilts, playing horse" (Pound 3). But the presence lingers on, until in the end, the "you" and "I" becomes "we," where the union has taken place: "And we went on living in the village of Chokan” (Pound 5). The feelings of “…without dislike or suspicion” (Pound 6) between them represents the start of their marriage. Dickinson mentions dropping “The Playthings of Her Life” to take over “…the honorable Work” “Of Woman, and of Wife” (3-4). These gender roles and responsibilities are less apparent in the first stanza of River-Merchant’s Wife, although it is clear that when the “I” is lost and becomes “we,” the little girl has dropped her needs and wants to become a woman and wife, in the sense that Dickinson talks about. To a great level, these poems parallel in the expression of marriage as a strong patriarchal convention. The boy comes with active games, which stands for his role as the actor and decision-maker of an uneven relationship. Women, on the contrary, have to drop their former lives to give way to new feminine roles and responsibilities. The second stanza of River-Merchant’s Wife underlines the strong feel of how marriage means loss of power and autonomy. Line 7 stresses the words that signify the lord-servant relationship between husband and wife in patriarchal societies: "My Lord you.” The “I” is gone and the “you” becomes Lord who must be served. This stanza matches more the first stanza of Dickinson’s She Rose to His Requirement. Indeed, a servant drops everything for her Lord, as the wife realizes the psychological conditions of marriage. Subordination reflects their marriage, where the girl becomes "bashful" with a lowered head gazing on walls. Her shyness is far from her gay girlhood years when she can be the actor in her games. Her looking at the walls reflects the bounds of being a wife, where the home seems like a place of prison walls. This stanza also reflects her young experience as a new wife. She feels inexperienced and unprepared for the night after marriage: “Called to, a thousand times, I never looked back” (Pound 10). Still, this line can also be said as time passing by that cannot be recovered. In the second stanza of She Rose to His Requirement, the speaker speaks of “wearing away” (8). It stands for the passage of time, where things happen to her, instead of her making things happen. The “Gold” is not supposed to wear away, but when it refers to one’s energy and youth, it does. In marriage, the Gold is offered only to man. He wins the conquest of a woman and carries his Gold. The woman might feel at “Awe” at first, but everything changes as marriage goes by, where changes can be positive or negative, depending on the couple and other circumstances. River-Merchant’s Wife explores the development of girlish love to a mature one. After a year, the speaker learns to love her husband. The wall, which once imprisoned her, becomes home and she realizes she wants to “mingle” their existence for years “Forever and forever and forever" (Pound 13). When she mentions not needing to "climb the lookout,” she believes that she no longer needs to guard her emotions (14). She realizes that she also "desired" the mingling of their dust and she arises from her severe containment. The appeal of forever awakens her senses to love. She knows that love can give meaning and purpose to her life and eternity in marriage becomes less of an obligation to her. In She Rose to His Requirement, the speaker may be said to also have developed a deeper appreciation for her marriage. The “…first Prospective…” has given way to a more lasting one as time goes on (Dickinson 7). The speaker understands that Gold is unimportant, or that materiality does not matter. What matters in marriage is the love that develops and endures. The material connections wear away and are replaced by true feelings of love. Love matures in River-Merchant’s Wife and She Rose to His Requirement. The third stanza of Pound’s poem describes the departure of the river-merchant. The woman feels her unhappiness. The changing of the seasons in nature illustrate that her love that is time-bound before in an abstract forever way has changed. “Forever” is not real, but the image of “different mosses” has become a strong reminder of her loss of her time with her husband (Pound 20). The image of “paired butterflies” signifies her fragile love and state. These butterflies are already yellow or aging. The grass that grows hurts her too since it underlines the time that she is separated from her husband. The waiting, nevertheless, strengthens her courage. She is prepared to meet him at "narrows of the river Kiang” (26). Her planned journey strengthens their marriage with her commitment to a more concrete place instead of the vague “forever.” Her love has finally matured. The same development of love can be seen from She Rose to His Requirement. What is "unmentioned" in "the Sea" where "Pearl" and "Weed" develop? The Pearl pertains to pure love, where Weed refers to the reality of marriage that tends to change in time. Still, only the man knows the "…Fathoms they abide" (12). The speaker discovers that she develops the love for her husband too in manners that go beyond her obligation. She finds the pearl in her union, where she also turns into a pearl herself. Love evolves in marriage. It starts from a marriage between strangers in a patriarchal society. Women drop their happiness and identities; they leave behind their childhood autonomy and freedom. Later on, Pound and Dickinson consider the possibility of a blooming love. If wives learn to love their husbands, then marriage becomes far from obligation. It turns into a marriage of equals, where love is the main driver and center. Love becomes more than an intense emotion, but a means of finding meaning and purpose in life for married women. Love evolves and transforms while changing those who are married too. Works Cited Dickinson, Emily. If You Were Coming in the Fall. ---. She Rose to His Requirement. ---. Tell All The Truth. Pound, Ezra. River-Merchant’s Wife. Read More