Analysis of WIFE MATERIAL
I wear onions for earrings
And orange peels for necklaces,
Rice balls cover my breasts
And beans line my waist
The water in my pots,
Boils to a hundred degrees
Oh yes, I can cook;
That’s five whole yards of Wife Material’
My knees are permanently scarred from kneeling,
Kneeling to scrub floors,
Kneeling to wash dirty linen,
Kneeling to straighten the linen after it is clean
And oh! My back is like that of an eighty-year old's,
After all, it does carry the pain of the weight of the entire household’s worries,
That’s ten extra yards of Wife Material.
Oh, and have you seen my hands,
How rough and pale they feel
From the harshness of detergent,
And from handling the garden hoe and the garden hose and the garden scythe?
Have you seen the stories the lines on my palms tell?
Those permanent etchings, my dears,
Are an extra twenty yards of proper Wife Material
Scheme | AXXXXBXC XXXXXBC XXXXXAC |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 1110110 01011100 111011 01111 010011 1101001 11111 1111110100 11110001110 10111 10111010 1011001010111 0111111111011 10111100110110010110 11101110100 1011111 110111 10101010 011001010010100101 111010011111 11001011 111010111010100 |
Closest metre | Iambic pentameter |
Characters | 874 |
Words | 173 |
Sentences | 5 |
Stanzas | 3 |
Stanza Lengths | 8, 7, 7 |
Lines Amount | 22 |
Letters per line (avg) | 31 |
Words per line (avg) | 7 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 228 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 52 |
About this poem
This is a satirical poem about the misogyny women have to face when they are told what a wife is supposed to be.
Font size:
Written on October 11, 2022
Submitted by kiamartina7 on October 11, 2022
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 52 sec read
- 0 Views
Citation
Use the citation below to add this poem analysis to your bibliography:
Style:MLAChicagoAPA
"WIFE MATERIAL" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 2 Jun 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/143995/wife-material>.
Discuss this Kia Martina poem analysis with the community:
Report Comment
We're doing our best to make sure our content is useful, accurate and safe.
If by any chance you spot an inappropriate comment while navigating through our website please use this form to let us know, and we'll take care of it shortly.
Attachment
You need to be logged in to favorite.
Log In