“What’s That Smell in the Kitchen?”

The tone of this poem is a mixture of emotions. She seems to enjoy being in his company, although the stories he shares break her heart. She expresses her conflicting feeling when she states the following:

Most people would not associate a joyous event and death. For instance, when someone is on a roller coaster, they hang on tight out of fear. The second stanza gives the details of how the father was knocking over pans and shelves. No fun event would require continuous destruction to the house. The reader also sees the mother in a seemingly helpless state as the father continues to damage the house. She seems to be in a state of dismay as her husband carries on his behavior. Her frown shows that his actions sadden her but she is powerless to stop him. One would think that a smile would be more appropriate. This supports the abuse aspect because she would not be frowning if it was a joyous exchange between the son and father.

She is realizing that she will have freedom through her husband death and whispers over and over, “free, free, free!” Her unhappiness is not with her husband, it is her rankings in society and becoming a widow is her only chance she has to gain the power, money, respect, and most of all freedom.

A literary device used in Jane Kenyon’s poem is selective perception .The first instance of selective perception is in the first two lines of the poem when the narrator says, “He suggests pancakes at the local diner, followed by a walk in search of mayflowers….” This is selective perception because the wife is only seeing what she wants to see, which is a husband who tells her exactly what he wants. The husband can be conceived as demanding because of the line, “He suggest…” Though the wife at least knows exactly what he wants. Thats why when she starts seeing another side of her husband it is so scary for her. She is starting to see a husband who is not direct or honest with her. In lines 4 and 5 the narrator says, “their cars pulled close along the sandy road…” This line could represent the selective perception beginning to crumble, like the road. The lie the husband created is starting to reveal itself. By the end of the poem the wife’s selective perception is gone. This is evident from the line, “The gather itself is not what astounds her, but the casual accomplishment with which he lied.” The fog has been lifted and she is starting to see the person she married.

Instead, we would say something like "We would eat at Howard Johnson's because you don't like it." This more formal conversation and speaker's tone, which is condescending, suggests a detachment the wife feels toward her husband.

To begin with, the author’s implementation of short sentence fragments throughout the poem illustrates the exasperation and frustration bottled up in women in response to

She seems to be saying that without the pain and the tribulations, a marriage wouldn’t be worth as much. It’s almost like she says that the sacrifices are what makes the marriage worth it. The pain of this marriage results in the ultimate achievement of the objective of marriage. The poem states that all the aches and pains of marriage are worth going through because the love of another is epic.  I found that the two of these poems together were a fascinating combination, because one speaks of the hypocrisy of not doing anything about the flaws in a person’s own characteristics, and the other seems to say to live with the pain that you have to live with the faults; through doing so one will find bliss; it is worth the sacrifice.

her true self and dies as

In the third stanza it states that “If she wants to grill anything, it's her husband spitted over a slow fire. This quote makes me feel that she want to kill her husband because he is probably not helping her at home and making her his slave. I believe that this person is tired of cooking and being a slave to her husband. In the end of the poem, it also states “During dinner is not incompetence but war”. This means that this happened for a long time I believe that women all over the world are being mistreated and they should stand up for what they believe in. Therefore women should be treated the same way men are being

“When you got to the table you couldn 't go right to eating, but you had to wait for the widow to tuck down her head and grumble a little over the victuals, though there warn 't really anything the matter with them, -- that is, nothing only everything was cooked by itself. In a barrel of odds and ends it is different; things get mixed up, and the juice kind of swaps around, and the things go better.” (Twain, 1)

that she may remain a housewife, but change the way she caters to her family. Despite all of the

more of an emptiness toward her mother. She feels as though her mother, Mabel, is

I thought what a wonderful way to tell a story” (Mujica 38). The reader is often present in the kitchen with Esquivel when she writes about her past experiences in the kitchen.

“My Husband Discovers Poetry”, by Diane Lockward is a very interesting piece of poetry that I have thoroughly enjoyed delving into. The idea behind the poem is that the writer felt angry and discouraged because her husband would never read her work, so essentially to get back at him she wrote a poem about cheating on him. She hid it away in the hopes that he would one day find and read it. This poem is Lockward telling the story of writing her poem, and what happens when her husband finally discovers it. The meaning of the poem is that we must support our loved ones.

the husband says, "What is it you see," / I will find out now--you must tell me, dear," (Lines 10, 12) which states problem solving technique from a man's side. The wife answers, "The wonder is I didn't see at once. / I never noticed it from here before. / I must be wonted to it--that's the reason" (Lines 21-23) showing the wife's overwhelming and emotionally involving period in her relationship with her husband. Solving these problems for the characters in the poem would "Depend on understanding the opposite sex" (Gray 30). If the characters knew the differences in "coping with stress" they would do something about their relationship.