Rhetorical Analysis of Gwendolyn Brooks' 'The Mother'

During this time in the United States of America, the freedom of choice is available to all. For the country to be at this state of freedom, there have been many laws revised and movements initiated by those who are passionate for the freedom. Concerning abortion, it was legal for women to have abortions late into their pregnancy before the late nineteenth century. There were early movements during this time attempting to make abortions illegal, ranging from the American Medical Association to the Catholic Church. The Roe v. Wade case legalized the right to obtain an abortion and still to this day the country is divided between legalizing or prohibiting abortions. Gwendolyn Brook’s “the mother” voices her anti-abortion opinion decades before Roe v. Wade through emotionally engaging stanzas. Brooks develops an immersive story of the unfulfilled life of an unborn child through vivid imagery and structure of the poem. Brooks introduces the tone and audience and transitions into explaining how diction and punctuation emphasize her thesis. The end-rhyme and meter contribute to the picture Brooks is painting of a child’s lost life, which strengthens her thesis and effective persuasion technique. These devices in “the mother” creates a compelling argument for respecting a potential life over a choice.

The poem is structured as if the speaker is Brooks and is in a one-sided conversation with the audience of mothers who had abortions and unborn children. The speaker begins the poem listing off the little moments most mothers would experience when raising a child, as if lecturing the mothers who chose to have an abortion about what they missed out on and taunting them knowing that “Abortions will not let you forget”. The rest of the poem switches audiences, as represented in the switch from a taunting tone, “Return for a snack of them, with gobbling mother-eye”, to an apologetic tone, “Believe me, I loved you all”. The change in tone signifies the attitude Brooks has towards abortion where she seems unforgiving towards mothers but is remorseful to the unborn children that did not have the chance to live. The tactic of voicing, “If I stole you births and your names, / Your straight baby tears and your games, / Your stilted lovely loves, your tumults, you marriages, / aches, and your deaths” brings to attention the life experiences that are withheld from the child along with their life. The message conveyed within these lines reminds the audience of the consequences that come with an abortion.

To bring her argument to life, Brooks employs imagery to aid in supporting the prohibition of abortions. The would-be memories of, “The damp small pulps with little or with no hair, / The singers and workers that never handled the air,” illustrates to mothers what potential their children could have had if given the chance. Apart from the lines that allow the visualization of the story, the imagery is also when Brooks allows the reader to visualize themselves in the memories that are listed. Listing the milestones in lifetime allows the reader to ponder on their own memories and what it would feel like if they never experienced their loves, marriages, or tears. Along with the imagery placed throughout the lines, the structure of the poem contributes to the visual developed especially in the last quatrain. Mimicking a person on the brink of death, “Believe me, I knew you, though faintly, and I loved, I loved / you / All.” imitates a labored breath fading as last words are spoken but instead of an older person speaking their final words, an unborn child is in their place who did not have the chance to take their first breathe of air. The gap between “If I stole your births and your names, / Your straight baby tears and your games” cuts the idea into half and marks an end to the idea, just like when a child’s life is cut short just before their birth and given a name.

The structure of the poem and the image displayed is further emphasized by the diction and punctuation to accentuate the passion for ceasing abortions. One instance of diction used as a key component in conveying the emotions Brook’s feels is when she feels as if she was the one who had the abortion. She writes, “I have heard in the voices of the wind the voices of my dim / killed children”. The “voices of the wind” are like the whispers of unborn children that are haunting Brooks, knowing that innocent lives were taken and that she could have prevented this happening. Referring to the unborn children as “dim dears” and “Sweets” explains how Brooks sees this occurrence as her fault and her own children. The use of periods along the poem is where Brooks seeks to emphasize her point one subjects such as how everyone deserves unconditional love: “Believe me, I loved you all'. Most of the lines that end with periods tend to state a fact or thought that processes through a mother’s mind: “Believe that even in my deliberateness I was not deliberate” and “Since anyhow you are dead”. Most mothers raise a baby tend to shower them in unconditional, motherly love and inserting periods it a way for the author to imply seriousness to their statement.

While reading along the poem, the deterioration in end-rhyme and varying meter play a significant role in symbolizing an embryo as it’s life slowly fades. The rhyme scheme begins stable and follows as aabbccddee in the first stanza but transitioning into the second stanza, the scheme begins to become irregular, such as the beginning of an irregular heartbeat. The stanza begins as normal with the first two lines following the previous pattern, but the pattern breaks down when – eased and suck – signifies the beginning of disorder in the rest of the stanzas and the ones following. Instead of the two sequential lines rhyming, the pattern shifts: ffghghij jkllmnnooppqrr stus. The meter tends to vary between spondee and iambic, but the common pattern is that when voicing dark or key phrases such as, “killed children.” and “You were born, you had body, you died”, utilizes spondee several times to slow down the pace of the poem for the reader to slow down and analyze the meaning behind the stressed syllables.

“The mother” employed several techniques, varying from imagery and structure to rhythm and meter, to persuade the reader to notice what underlying consequences accompany abortions. The techniques separately resembled an embryo from its fading heartbeat and unrequited life in terms of structure, rhythm, and imagery, causing the reader to be sympathetic towards the loss of a life. The factors of punctuation, diction, and meter are utilized when Brooks emphasizes points that she wants to reader to take away from the poem. The poem all together creates a compelling argument for pro-life over pro-choice, and it points out the repercussions that many do not think about.

Works Cited

1. Brooks, Gwendolyn. “the mother.” The Seagull Reader: Poems. Third Edition. Ed. Joseph Kelly. New York: W.W. Norton, 2015.