hey guys im desprete here ......... i need poems that discusses mother daught relations ships throught stages of growing up and i have found suitable poetry for most stages but one that im find it hard for is a poem with like this type of set up

Mother speaking angrily of her daughter at the 10 - 12 range about how she doesnt do as she is asked and stuff like that (not too good at expalins subjects and plots) but yeha nay help would be great sorry i cnat give u more on wat i need
*E*M*M*A*

Here you go Emma, good luck with your assignment:

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Les

This poem by Sylvia Plath might fill the bill:

Sylvia Plath - Mirror

I am silver and exact. I have no preconceptions.
Whatever I see I swallow immediately
Just as it is, unmisted by love or dislike.
I am not cruel, only truthful --
The eye of a little god, four-cornered.
Most of the time I meditate on the opposite wall.
It is pink, with speckles. I have looked at it so long
I think it is part of my heart. But it flickers.
Faces and darkness separate us over and over.

Now I am a lake. A woman bends over me,
Searching my reaches for what she really is.
Then she turns to those liars, the candles or the moon.
I see her back, and reflect it faithfully.
She rewards me with tears and an agitation of hands.
I am important to her. She comes and goes.
Each morning it is her face that replaces the darkness.
In me she has drowned a young girl, and in me an old woman
Rises toward her day after day, like a terrible fish.

Les

Eavan Boland - The Pomegranate

The only legend I have ever loved is
the story of a daughter lost in hell.
And found and rescued there.
Love and blackmail are the gist of it.
Ceres and Persephone the names.
And the best thing about the legend is
I can enter it anywhere. And have.
As a child in exile in
a city of fogs and strange consonants,
I read it first and at first I was
an exiled child in the crackling dusk of
the underworld, the stars blighted. Later
I walked out in a summer twilight
searching for my daughter at bed-time.
When she came running I was ready
to make any bargain to keep her.
I carried her back past whitebeams
and wasps and honey-scented buddleias.
But I was Ceres then and I knew
winter was in store for every leaf
on every tree on that road.
Was inescapable for each one we passed.
And for me.
It is winter
and the stars are hidden.
I climb the stairs and stand where I can see
my child asleep beside her teen magazines,
her can of Coke, her plate of uncut fruit.
The pomegranate! How did I forget it?
She could have come home and been safe
and ended the story and all
our heart-broken searching but she reached
out a hand and plucked a pomegranate.
She put out her hand and pulled down
the French sound for apple and
the noise of stone and the proof
that even in the place of death,
at the heart of legend, in the midst
of rocks full of unshed tears
ready to be diamonds by the time
the story was told, a child can be
hungry. I could warn her. There is still a chance.
The rain is cold. The road is flint-coloured.
The suburb has cars and cable television.
The veiled stars are above ground.
It is another world. But what else
can a mother give her daughter but such
beautiful rifts in time?
If I defer the grief I will diminish the gift.
The legend will be hers as well as mine.
She will enter it. As I have.
She will wake up. She will hold
the papery flushed skin in her hand.
And to her lips. I will say nothing.

Hugh! You brought it all back! Cruel!



Stephen

And you were doing so well.......

pam

What was that one, again a mother writing about a daughter, where the girl is just approaching puberty? I remember things like the smell of musk, the girl talking on the phone behind closed doors, and dust balls left in the hallway from her slippers.

This one, Hugh?
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Stephen

That's the one - nice find, thanks!

I know this is father-son, and you wanted mother-daughter, but the sentiments cross over the gender divide. It is by Jack, a friend of mine and a pretty damn good poet, who posts on the User Submitted Poetry forum.

Eleven

Eleven fresh inches fell last night
First real snow of the year
Sunday morning, no plans
Perfect for hills, toboggans and cocoa

Suiting up, he says to me
'These boots are too small, even with thin socks'
He's only eleven
His feet are nearly as big as mine
'Here, take my spares (size eleven)
Wear thick socks, two pair'
I only wear them now when it's really cold anyway

We'd been down the hill three times
I on the toboggan, he on his saucer
On the way back up, it hit me like a bolt
He had reached the top before me
twice. He was doing it again, in my boots!

I first took him down this hill
ten years ago. Before he could walk
I carried him back to the top
all day, in those boots

Jesus. Next year he'll be twelve.
I knew everything when I was twelve
Taller than my old man when I was thirteen
He knows so much already
Will he know it all next year?

Will he know the world is full of hunger and injustice?
Will he understand despair and apathy?
Will he experience heartache and rage?
Will he learn that there are people full of hatred?
People who would happily take his life
and rejoice that they had done a holy thing?

Now he's racing down the hill
Snow crystals on his eyelashes
wearing a cocoa mustache
screaming with delight

If I don't reach the top first
I'll never hear the end of it
Eleven... Jesus!



Stephen