Adrienne Rich’s Twenty-One Love Poems depicts the ebb and flow of a relationship on the surface. Her lines seem to describe the hardships of a relationship surrounded by the city. However, when framed with the fact that these poems were written for her lesbian lover, each of her statements become more than just a description of a passionate relationship; they are a social commentary on the hardships of a relationship not considered the “norm” in her society. Rich’s poems draw a story of a relationship in its entirety, and within that story, her choice of words, phrasing, and metaphors clearly demonstrate how difficult her relationship had been for her.

Rich opens with a poem that contains the line “No one has imagined us” (236). With this line, she is openly claiming that their relationship (which exists in a city of “pornography, science-fiction vampires” [236]), is something that hasn’t been thought of. In a society which chooses to actively imagine vampires and other fiction, the thought of two women together is still considered absurd. Without the framing of who the poems was written for, this line could easily be misinterpreted to only mean no one could see the two lovers together due to their personalities, or other circumstances. In Poem II, Rich states: “I laugh and fall dreaming again/of the desire to show you to everyone I love,/to move openly together/in the pull of gravity, which is not simple” (237). In this instance, her choice of the words “desire” and “openly” clearly demonstrate her need to freely act as she wants. However we see that society, which she compares to gravity, has made it difficult. It is also interesting to note that with this interpretation, accepted societal norms is taken as fact, as gravity is–like it can not be changed. The fact from Poem I, that two women together is a crazier notion than science-fiction vampires or televising pornography is, like gravity, pulling them down. However, again it could have easily been a weaker statement had it not been framed with an idea of who the poem was written for. In Poem XIX, Rich addresses their struggle straightforwardly saying “two women together is a work/nothing in civilization has made simple” (245). This is the clearest example of Rich’s commentary on how her relationship’s battle against society is not simple.