------------------------------------------------- 4. Describe at least TWO interesting language features and/or word choices used in the text.
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Explain why the features and/or word choices are effective.
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Language features could include: interesting word choice, simile, metaphor,
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personification, sound devices, symbol, sentence types, etc.

Unknown Girl in the Maternity Ward Essay

“Go child, who is my sin and nothing more.” The most defining characteristic of confessional poetry is that it focuses on a subject matter that was considered immoral and inappropriate. ‘Unknown Girl in the Maternity Ward’ is a confessional poem written by Anne Sexton, concerning a young mother who is expected to give up her newborn baby. Written from a first-person point of view, Sexton invites the reader to live through the thoughts and feelings of the mother through the effective use of a many language features such as similes, metaphors, caesuras/enjambments, and interesting word choice.

The first stanza starts with intriguing word choice. “The current of your breath” indicates the connotations of movement and life from the newborn baby, though it can also negatively connote a sign of violence or destruction in the extreme relation to tsunamis, implying power and/or trouble. Sexton describes the baby as “a small knuckle” and “fisted like a snail”. The metaphor and simile both suggest the way the baby is lying curled up in a ball, yearning for protection from the mother as the comparison to a snail gives the meaning of being fragile and weak. The effective word choice of using “the nurses nod their caps” in place of saying heads, show how the people in the hospital use their profession over of their own heart and mind, and the young mother sees the caps as a symbol of the nurses just doing their job.

This mother then directs her attention to her surroundings, using vocabulary such as “shepherded”, “starch” and “unnested” that all imply negative connotations. “Shepherded” has the relation to animals, and the “starch” halls tells us the hospital is hard and not caring towards the mother as starch is a powder that is used as a stiffening agent to makes things tough. Also, besides the relation to animalistic (not human) qualities in “unnested” and “throng”, these words hint that the baby is just one out of many unwanted newborns in the maternity ward. “Unnested” additionally gives the idea that the baby will not be staying for long.

Turning her attention back her baby, Sexton uses a the possessive pronoun “my” in the simile “you tip like a cup; your head moving to my touch. Alternating her attention between the hospital environment and her baby with caesuras indicates the mother’s worries and that her mind is agitated and on edge. The correlation with a “cup” can be interpreted into how mother is seeing the baby as an inanimate object, something that is cold and again like a snail’s shell, can be easily broken. The diction “You sense the way we belong” conveys the beginning of an unspoken connection between the young mother and her baby. However there is an abrupt change of heart in the next line where Sexton starts with the conjunction “but” indicating the realisation that she is in an environment where society expects unmarried mothers to give up their own. The language features in this stanza effectively portray the mother’s disconnected feelings towards the baby, that she is mostly thinking with her head (not her heart) and there is impression of discomfort in this “institution”.

The negative connotations in the metaphor “the doctors are enamel” used in the second stanza yields the perception of the doctors being stern and hard, like unbending metal, not willing to listen. Describing birth as “I burst empty of you” is incredibly violent and connotes a wave relief, but with “empty”, it sounds almost as if she was glad to be physically apart. “All I did was let you grow” and “letting you learn how the air is so” both tell us how the mother is trying to convince herself that she has done nothing wrong, that she gave this baby life, but “Now we are here for the ward to see” implies regret and almost blame for the embarrassment she has to endure. The last sentence (which is a minor sentence) “I do not know”, conveys the young mother’s state of mind. She is either keeping a secret, or lost with confusing, mixed emotions. This stanza spotlights the effectiveness of Sexton’s diction and how her thoughtful word choice has given readers so much detail by allowing them to “read between the lines.”

In this detained hospital bed, the mother turns to the baby in the third stanza, starting it with a powerful possessive pronoun. “Yours is the only face I recognize” signifies a further developing connection, written with a soft and mellow undertone. “Bone at my bone” is similar to the cliché saying “skin to skin” contact which is a very important bonding method between baby and parent. But, this frustrates the situation, as the mother cannot keep her baby. Though, I think the mother is oblivious to this, and that in this moment, she feels almost one with this baby in her arms. “Six times a day I prize your need, the animals of your lips, your skin growing warm and plump.” This is a complex sentence, describing the baby’s reliance on the mother, and then the noun “prize” is used as a verb, implying feelings of enjoyment and content because she has the ability to satisfy her baby. Sexton conveys positive connotations in “warm” and “plump” which reflect the emotional associations and connections the mother is having with this baby.

“I see your eyes lifting their tents. They are blue stones, they begin to outgrow their moss.” Sexton uses imagery of nature to portray how she sees the baby, “lifting their tents” meaning awakening to life and emerging into the wilderness of the world. The metaphor “they are blue stones” connotes the eyes to look like precious gems such as sapphires, or, it might refer to another “current” comparison, where waters such as rivers kick stones “to life” and move them along with the flow. In doing so, the rocks no longer gather moss because they are no longer still, so “they begin to outgrow their moss.” This stanza captures the growing love the mother feels and the start of accepting of the baby as family with the possessive pronoun and effective word choice in “my funny kin”. However like in the first stanza, realisation hits and the mother and she registers her situation “I am a shelter of lies.” The young mother’s admission cuts in after a caesura, and implies that she does know the answers to the doctors’ questions. Caesuras are used in all of the stanzas to show disrupted thoughts. Even so, I think it strikes the most attention in stanzas three and four, because it is where it has been used most effectively, and to further express to mother’s inner conflict, Sexton ends the stanza with the rhetorical question, “Should I learn to speak again, or hopeless in such sanity will I touch some face I recognize?”

In the fourth stanza, “My arms fit you like a sleeve, they hold catkins of your willows, the wild bee farms of your nerves, each muscle and fold of your first days” is the longest sentence that has been written with enjambment (used for continuity) which like caesuras, occur throughout the whole poem. The simile connotes that the mother and baby are made for each other and it is meant to be, and once again, Sexton uses metaphoric imagery to describe the natural beauty she feels and sees within this baby. She also begins to give the baby human qualities. “The wild bee farms of your nerves, each muscle and fold”.

“Your old man’s face disarms the nurses” is a metaphor that suggests that the baby is a boy, and illustrates an idea of a newborn baby’s face all wrinkly and, typically “ugly”, yet the nurses still fawn over “him” because he was still a baby after all. The line: “Name of father-none.” The poet uses quotation marks to illustrate a clear image of the mother answering an abrupt but unwavering “none”. It stands out because after doubting her silence, readers expect her to answer the doctors truthfully for her baby’s benefit – but she catches us off-guard. The effective use mainly of metaphorical language in stanzas three and four provide positive and loving feelings toward the baby, contrasting against the negative sense focused in the first and second stanza.

“And now that’s that” Starting with a conjunction, the fifth stanza strikes finality and Sexton’s use of connotations in her word choice immediately indicates a change in mood. The mother is resigned to the fact that she cannot keep her baby. She has already lost her dignity, and now her child is being taken away from her. “There is nothing more that I can say or lose.” Giving up her baby for adoption is also described as “trading life”. This gives a very harsh and negative connotation that shows how the mother is convincing herself that she is not doing something terrible, however Sexton’s word choice “trade” connotes association with money, which implies that the mother is ignoring her emotions, almost giving her baby away on “business” terms.

Sexton really depicts the mother’s struggle by using “tightens to refuse” like the mother has to steel herself away to the task she knows she has to do. However, “your owling eyes” and “my fragile visitor” convey that the decision has already been made, and it feels as if the baby gives big, pleading eyes because it already knows its fate. The use of “visitor” like “unnested” in the first stanza tells us that the baby was never going to stay for long. We can almost feel the way the mother’s heart swell as Sexton writes “I touch your cheeks, like flowers” as this simile gives beautiful and loving imagery, showing the mother’s guilt and sadness as she tries to comfort the baby. It gives the sense that she is trying to apologize, by touching the baby’s cheeks like a sign of reassurance, and but, “you bruise against me” portrays where the mother’s mind is set. She “bruises” the baby, saying that she leaves a mark, that she is bad for the baby, and she will only hurt if she decides keep to him.

Sexton writes, “We unlearn. I am a shore rocking you off.” This stanza is full of caesuras, as the disjointed flow of rhythm effectively emphasizes the mother’s inner-conflict. The short and sharp sentences impersonates the hastened blunt thoughts of the mother as she realises the more she doubts the what needs to be done, the more attached she becomes with the baby. “Shore rocking you off” is another water/current reference, which connotes purity yet power. The mother forces herself away from the baby, and the uses of “rocks” suggest harm. They cut and bruise, they ruin things violently and cause devastating, resembling the idea that the past six days spent with this beautiful baby, is being shattered. Also, “rocking” something off implies that it tears away in barriers, like the mother has to break the barriers of love she has made with this baby to let go of it.

“I choose your only way, my small inheritor and hand you off, trembling the selves we lose.” By writing this, she is being sympathetic and expressing how much the baby means to a mother, and how letting him go is like disowning a part of herself. It is probably one of the hardest experiences this girl has gone through. The poem ends with “Go child, who is my sin…” This command shows her dismissive attitude towards her baby, by using “child” and “sin” which negatively connotes a detached connection and the belief that this baby represents her wrongdoing. “… and nothing more” displays powerful diction, adding a very callous touch as the mother’s fulfills her ultimatum.

In “Unknown Girl in the Maternity Ward” language features such as metaphors, similes and interesting word choice are used effectively and powerfully to not only convey compassionate emotions to readers, but to provide an insight to the different perspective regarding young pregnancies in the late 19th century, empowering an appreciation for the way young mothers are treated and given support today. Sexton also uses another language feature: Rhyming. She applies it in a strong ABAB form, which gives a lot of emotion to simple words at the end of lines. Also, there is a repetitive pattern where the end of each stanza relates back to the first lines of the stanza, for example: Stanza 1 – “…six days long” followed by “You will not know me very long”, Stanza 2 – “They want to know the facts” followed by “I do not know”, Stanza 3 – “Yours is the only face I recognize” followed by “…or hopeless in such sanity will I touch a face I recognize?” Stanza 4 – “My arms fit you like a sleeve” followed by “I hold you and name you bastard in my arms”, and lastly, in Stanza 5, “There is nothing more I can say or lose” is redirected by “…who is my sin and nothing more.” This confessional poem has been written with such intensity and thought, that it inevitably invites the reader to live and suffer vicariously through the poem in the shoes of this young girl.