In this poem of Sharon Olds, an American poet, writing about her personal, emotional experience depicting a woman‘s life as looking at the mirror while her daughter combing her hair. In this situation, the daughter’s hair is beautifully silken brown. But the mother’s hair at this time will become grey because no woman having a growing daughter and still very young. Life matters and duty, and the birth of children don’t allow the mother to stay as she is young and beautiful. Even the skin of the mother by that time will have wrinkle while the beauty of the mother will be taken from the mother to the children. The way the mother looks and feel will be affected by the time change and the duty she is carrying out in order to have a family. This story is an old story, all women, since long time. The relationship of daughters with their parents portrayed in the poem as an emotional states and how well being of mothers in general. Sharon Olds’s poetry in this poem is very easy and direct and in a free verse style. The images are nicely drawn and can be felt by many women.
Olds’s is saying in this poem that motherhood is like a cycle in this life. Mothers get daughters, daughters become mothers. Beauty will change from childhood and parenthood. The poem circle childhood and motherhood both in opposite directions, rendering life as a cycle.
