Woman Enough -Erica Jong

Because my grandmother's hours

were apple cakes baking,

& dust motes gathering,

& linens yellowing

& seams and hems

inevitably unraveling

I almost never keep house

though really I like houses

& wish I had a clean one.

Because my mother's minutes

were sucked into the roar

of the vacuum cleaner,

because she waltzed with the washer-dryer

& tore her hair waiting for repairmen

I send out my laundry,

& live in a dusty house,

though really I like clean houses

as well as anyone.

I am woman enough

to love the kneading of bread

as much as the feel

of typewriter keys

under my fingers

springy, springy.

& the smell of clean laundry

& simmering soup

are almost as dear to me

as the smell of paper and ink.

I wish there were not a choice;

I wish I could be two women.

I wish the days could be longer.

But they are short.

So I write while

the dust piles up.

I sit at my typewriter

remembering my grandmother

& all my mothers,

& the minutes they lost

loving houses better than themselves

& the man I love cleans up the kitchen

grumbling only a little

because he knows

that after all these centuries

it is easier for him

than for me

In the poem Woman Enough even though Erica mentions that she does not follow the footsteps of her grandmother and mother, she still consider herself woman enough to make her own decisions. For this poem by Erica it would be consider to be a free verse poem, since it doe not contain any pattern of stressed or unstressed syllables. The poem would be in a structure of a cause and effect structure, because her mother and grandmother spent the majority of their life cooking and baking ; she is unable to keep her own house clean , rather the dusty. The word" dust" gives us an idea that her house is dirty. A good example of imagery and touch would in stanza 3 " love the kneading of bread as much as the feel of typewriter keys under my fingers" as well as " the smell of clean laundry & simmering soup... The smell of ink and paper". In stanza 

2 we can see an example of personification "my mother minutes were sucked into the roar of the vacuum cleaner, because she waltzed with the washer - dryer" The tone would be determined in my option as she has chosen things that she rather do and enjoys it. Instead then stay like her mother and do the typical woman work she wants to do something new that is a passion towards her.