She Was Waiting To Be Told Poem Analysis

The poem "She Was Waiting to Be Told" by Deborah Garrison, is a story about a woman being oppressed. In the poem the wife speaks directly to you, meaning her husband. The author isn’t just addressing the poem to her husband but to the world, to tell a point of view of being oppressed. The speaker in the poem submits to her husband throughout the poem. I believe that the author wrote this poem to express and promote women 's rights. The speaker of the poem has learned what her husband wants and does it. The speaker’s every action is about her husband.

The speaker states “For you she learned”, meaning that what she does isn’t of her own accord. Her husband makes her wear a dress and lipstick to be pretty for him. The words the speaker used are “short black slip” and “red lipstick” which objectify her into being a sex symbol. To make her husband or one of his friends the topic of conversation she phrases what he wants to say about someone else. The speaker begins a conversation with “Didn’t you think” or “Weren’t you sorry.” She is so oppressed that she can’t even state her own ideas.
She has learned to do things in order to not embarrass her husband in a formal setting, like how to order wine and drink it properly. The speaker mentions that she calls his “best friends by their schoolboy names.” By calling them by their schoolboy names like her husband …show more content…
The physical crossing of her arms to forms an X is her subtle way of saying no. An X symbolizes that something is not allowed, in this case it is the sex. She doesn’t have a choice to say no, the poem must be in a setting that promotes women should do what their husband tell them. Even though she never verbally told him no she did not consent to the encounter. The speaker is so submissive to her husband that she just goes along with what he wants. By not consenting to the sex is this