Climbing You - Erica Jong

I want to understand the steep thing

that climbs ladders in your throat.

I can't make sense of you.

Everywhere I look you're there--

a vast landmark, a volcano

poking its head through the clouds,

Gulliver sprawled across Lilliput.

I climb into your eyes, looking.

The pupils are black painted stage flats.

They can be pulled down like window shades.

I switch on a light in your iris.

Your brain ticks like a bomb.

In your offhand, mocking way

you've invited me into your chest.

Inside: the blur that poses as your heart.

I'm supposed to go in with a torch

or maybe hot water bottles

& defrost it by hand

as one defrosts an old refrigerator.

It will shudder & sigh

(the icebox to the insomniac).

Oh there's nothing like love between us.

You're the mountain, I am climbing you.

If I fall, you won't be all to blame,

but you'll wait years maybe

for the next doomed expedition

This poem is about a girl who's loves a guy who is hard to read. Which makes it difficult for her to make sense of him, making her to work for the love. Some of the figurative language I found was metaphor. " The pupils are black painted stage flats". For imagery the line" Everywhere I look you're there a vast landmark, a volcano poking its head through the clouds." is a great example. As you can read it and visualize a volcano through clouds barely showing itself. This line could also be served as a personification and a metaphor. With this line you can also see how the speaker feels about him,how she always seem to see him; like a mountain, its always there and can never miss it."I'm supposed to go in with a torch or maybe hot water bottles and defrost it by hand as one defrost an old  refrigerator.It will shudder & sigh" This would be personification towards the refrigerator. The last line in stanza 2 "Your brain ticks like a boom" and " The can be pulled down like window shades" would be similes.