Analysis of the poem: Our Whole Life

By: Adrienne Rich 

Overtime Adrienne Rich's poetry had changed markedly as she began exploring woman's issues and moving away from formal poetry toward a free verse that she saw as more in tune with her true voice. In the poem "Our Whole Life" Rich examines a relationship and sees its hopelessness and dishonesty but in doing so shows that society is misleading in similar ways. Rich comments on a relationship as well as society, "Our Whole Life. It seems more of a feminist reading as it attempts to escape the male, represented by the "oppressor's language" including the theme of power.  The tone of the poem is serious and monotonous. The poem is broken into structures which show the corruption and breaking of society.