“The Possessive” by Sharon Olds is a poem about a mother seeing her daughter with a symbolic haircut she dislikes. Her adjectives convey cutting and pain that suggest that by getting a haircut, her daughter had hurt her. In “The Possessive” the author uses the daughter’s hair to express teenage rebellion and a mother’s unwilling recognition of her daughter’s growing independence.
Olds shows the image of her daughter before the recent hair cut. The speaker describes the hair as once being “wispy as a frayed bell pull”. This also suggests the daughter as innocent because a bell pull is found most commonly in a church. This can also be used metaphorically to describe a young child, innocent in every way and unable to cause pain. This contrasts to the new haircut because instead of being soft and wispy, it is keen and agonizing. This is where the first descriptions of sharpness and pain are revealed. The barber is described as a “knife grinder” and the cutting of the hair was described as sharpening. This makes the haircut seem like it was a dreadful experience to the mother maybe because the daughter went without permission. Perhaps by rebelling in this subtle way, she has sharpened the blade of pain that the mother feels when she sees that the daughter is indeed no longer an innocent bell pull. The mother is not ready to accept this yet and by showing that this haircut causes her pain, she is recognizing that she is unhappy about her daughter’s growing independence. If the mother was happy, about it, then the speaker’s words would not show pain, and have less expressions of negativity. This haircut instead of being positive toward the relationship of the mother and daughter conveys intensity of the haircut as an upsetting experience for the mother by saying that it “cut both ways. The mother expresses that it not only hurts to see her daughter as no longer a child, but the fact that she had this done without permission, slices her mother’s soul like a carbon steel knife progressing through her mother’s tender heart.
The description of “The curtain of dark paper cuts” is used to describe the agony the daughter causes the mother. The things she does are probably very small, but like paper cuts, each hurts an immense amount because even though the wounds are small, they can also amount to more pain by there being more of them. Also, the fact that they are described as a “veil” gives an image that the two are now separated. If the mother tries to break through the curtain, she will only come out with hundreds of small, dark, paper cuts and although they are small, because there are so many of them, they will be all the more excruciating. The description of the hair as “spliced ropes” also conveys that by going to the barber, the bell pull that the mother had worked so hard to bring up and piece together has been sliced. This also suggests that their relationship between mother and daughter has been severed.
The speaker in this poem also uses the description of her daughter’s hair to portray their relationship as mother and daughter to be in a continuous warlike state. The depiction of the hair as a “bright helmet” reminds one of war where one must be offensive and defensive at the same time. The looks of “distance” from the daughter express furthermore that she no longer feels part of the mother and that they are very separate. Also, the “looks of fire in her eyes” foreshadow teenage rebellion and fury brewing. The result of this is that the mother and daughter will probably have a conflict. The use of the phrases, “my body, my daughter “also proves that the mother is still very possessive of her daughter and still does not want to let her go. The daughter who is constantly pulling away from the mother shows that the opposing forces will soon bring signs of a battle. “The watch fires of an enemy, a while before the war starts”. The conclusion of this poem predicts the coming battle between mother and daughter.
“The Possessive” is used to illustrate that being a mother to a teenage daughter is complicated. This is well conveyed through the many metaphors of cutting and battle. The theme of separation and loss of parental control over the young adult are prevalent. In the poem, Sharon Olds demonstrates to the reader the emotional troubles of being a mother who is dealing with teenage independence.
