Naked Love

“True Love” and “The Flurry” by Sharon Olds are the incredible poems that depict the relationships between the two married couples that seem to be unhappy if to look deeper into their inner feelings. Both poems make a reader observe the meaning of love in marriage and the main reasons that unite people and separate them from each other, causing an irresistible desire to be free. Thus, love binds the lovers through making sex and upbringing of their children in “True Love”, and it becomes naked and relentless in “The Flurry”, when one of the spouses decides to divorce, not taking into account the future sufferings of their children’s.

True love relates to sincere feelings that must be eternal, as sex and children combine people to spend the whole life in joy and grief together. In the poem “True Love”, Sharon Olds explores different issues that contribute to the feeling of true love, even if her explanations are not modest but persuasive. It is evident that the speaker of the poem is a woman, who tries to reflect on her love life with her husband after making love. It is difficult to understand whether the woman is satisfied or not, but she indicates: “In the middle of the night, when we get up/

after making love, we look at each other in/ complete friendship” (Olds 1-3). On the one hand, these words prove that their relationship is very warm, and both can trust each other like friends; on the other hand, it means that love between the two is fading.

Intimacy is one of the most significant things in marriage that makes a husband and a wife live in comfort and peace; this kind of relationship positively affects it and leads to true love. The speaker shares with the reader the most sacred parts of her private life, trying to explain that if there is no sincere love, sex will never be pleasant. Moreover, the woman is equal, according to her husband, and she does not feel any shame, while sharing her emotions about sex and passion. The tone sounds very optimistic, and the speaker’s voice is soft and confident when the speaker says: “I know where you are/ with my eyes closed,/ we are bound to each other/with huge invisible threads, our sexes/ muted, exhausted, crushed” (Olds 9-12). Thus, the speaker wants the reader to understand that they live in a perfect union and see each other as one.

However, praising the most precious moment after making love, the author uses a particular word choice, compelling one to believe that two persons are not tied to each other in a positive way. Firstly, Olds claims that the husband and his wife are “bound to each other/

like mountaineers coming down from a mountain”, and it sounds quite persuasive (Olds 4-5). Their life and love seem to be so ideal that it is difficult to imagine that something might be wrong in the relationships. Such a strange thought leads to the conflict of the poem, as the reader starts musing on the fact, whether it is good or bad being bound closely to another person. In fact, the wife can think that marriage is a trap for her, as she depends on sex with her husband and their children. It is obvious that the author applies the words “bound” and “tie” in the form of a negative connotation. Thus, the reader begins to assume that the relationships between the lovers are not stable.

Love is not eternal, and even children cannot save the marriage if parents decide to get divorced. In contrast to “True Love”, “The Flurry” reflects on even warmer relationships, despite the fact that it is a different kind of love. The first lines “When we talk about when to tell the kids,/ we are so together, so concentrated” give a precise hint to the reader that there is some tension in the couple, and they even do not know how to tell their children that love is over (Olds 1-2). It is evident that both regret it, but it seems to them that the best solution is to live separately, as their marriage now seems like a torture. In this poem, there is a short dialogue between a husband and a wife and the deaf silence covers their so-called conversation when the woman says: “I feel like a killer” (Olds 3). However, the man rejects his wife’s thought, considering that he is to blame for everything that has happened with their family. The most touching thing is that they do not shout at each other, because both understand that it is the end, and it makes no sense to mark time.

The one and only thing, which is left between a husband and a wife, is respect, as a man considers himself as a killer. The speaker of this poem is a woman too, but she differs from the speaker from the poem “True Love”. In the poem “The Flurry”, the woman does not long for freedom and independence because she loves her husband and will love him eternally. Her inner fear to lose her husband lead to the creation of conflict that is related to the speaker’s desire to stay with her husband by rejecting reality. Moreover, the speaker makes considerable efforts to hide her emotions and feelings but indicates: “I tell him I will try to fall out of/ love with him, but I feel I will love him/ all my life (Olds 18-20). In this case, the tone of the poem is pessimistic, and the voice of the speaker is soft and sad; thus, both elements reinforce the conflict of the narrator, who merely cannot break up the relationships.