Similarities Between Metaphors By Gwendolyn Brooks

In “The Mother” by Gwendolyn Brooks and “Metaphors” by Sylvia Plath, both writers describe a mother’s personal thoughts and emotions through their journey of motherhood. In order to defend the mother both poems provide positive aspects of a mother .Whether they are a mother with a child or an aborted child. The poems describe both black and white areas of motherhood and how we shouldn’t mark mothers that have children or aborted children as horrible mothers. Instead, we should consider the circumstances in which both mothers are going through and take into consideration that mothers are mothers whether or not they had the child. The poem “The Mother” the author Gwendolyn Brooks describes a graphic description of a child in the womb forced to death by the mother. The mother in the poem describes what her children would have become if she would have not aborted them and the pleasures of what her children would have brought upon her. During the first few lines of the poem the mother emphasizes “Abortions will not let you forget” (Brooks Line 1) telling the reader that abortions are so

Plath describes the woman by first saying “I’m a riddle in nine syllables” (Plath Line 1) and the poem is nine lines so we know she’s describing herself in this poem. The nine lines also correspond to nine months of pregnancy and each line contains nine syllables. The basic conflict she interferes with is individuality and motherhood. The narrator felt that in order to stand up to her duty as a mother, she will have to sacrifice her individuality. She expresses pregnancy in a sorrow way saying “A melon strolling on two tendrils” (Plath Line 3). She’s expressing how big and round she is due to her pregnancy and she’s strolling on her two little legs trying to carry a baby. She’s very discouraged by her physical appearance from her pregnancy. She expresses very little joy with her body