The pulitzer prize winning poet, Anne Sexton's poetry is often categorized as confessionalism.

Whether directly or indirectly, her poetry tends to represent her feeling or something that has happened to her in her life. Often times, these poems revolved around her thoughts of depression and suicide, however they often contain thoughts about relationships with her parents and other people in her life. Perhaps the poem "Red Roses" reflects the idea of some sort of abuse from Anne's parents when she was younger or perhaps abuse she inflicted upon her own children. Either way, Anne uses tone, imagery, and figurative language, to convey the relationship between "Tommy" and his mother. One way that Anne Sexton conveys this relationship is through the tone of the poem. from the very beginning of the poem, the reader can tell that the tone is going to be somewhat depressing because it starts off with "Tommy is three and when he's bad" (line 1). This somewhat depressing tone continues with the later line "broken scarecrow" (line 10). This same tone is continued until a small shift that occurs in line 24 when a new stanza is begun. In this new stanza, there is still a depressing tone, however it shifts to almost one of nostalgia. This is achieved by talking about Tommy's love for his mother. "For he loves Blue Lady and the spots" (line 27). This shift in tone conveys the complex relationship between "Tommy" and his mother because it shows the depressing, hatred aspect of the abuse, yet it shows the fact that Tommy doesn't want to leave, because he still has love for his mother. Another way in which Sexton conveys the relationship in this poem, is

through imagery. Anne Sexton uses a lot of different types of imagery in this poem. This imagery allows the reader to feel the pain that Tommy feels. For example "the leg, twisted like a licorice stick," (line 12) this visual imagery allows the reader to picture the wounded leg, thus feel the pain. There is also some auditory imagery seen when talking about the music of the "Red Roses for a Blue Lady" (line 4) and when she mentions the mother's yelling in line 22. This imagery allows the reader to truly understand the emotion in these scenes. This imagery conveys the relationship between Tommy and his mother because it allows the reader to feel the pain from the abuse Tommy receives. It also creates a scene of raised emotions that allows the reader to understand the chaos of these scenes, thus further conveying the dysfunctional relationship between the two characters in the poem. The last and mort important technique Sexton uses to show this relationship is with figurative language. One of the primary forms of figurative language the poet uses is simile. She uses these similes to describe the wounds that Tommy receives. For example " the head, that time he was as sleepy as a river," (line 9). This simile shows that Tommy may have hurt his head and gotten knocked out. THis is similar to the simile "the leg, twisted like a licorice stick," (line 12). This simile shows that his leg may haves been broken at one point. Overall these similes are clear examples of the pain that Tommy endures. This being said, this is not the only type of figurative language present in this poem. There is also a good deal of symbolism. The most recurring symbol in the poem is the "Red Roses", these

red roses are most likely symbolic for bruises or wounds of some kind. The "blue Lady" most like symbolizes the mother, where as the "singing" and "dancing" most likely represent yelling and beating. In the end, these figurative devices work together to both convey emotions and pain, as well as conveying the relationship by showing the anger in the mother and the pain felt by Tommy. In conclusion, Anne Sexton used tone, imagery, and figurative language to convey a relationship of abuse yet love between Tommy and his mother. With the use of these poetic devices, Sexton was able to turn a simple story into something much deeper and more meaningful. No matter how the subject matter related to Sexton, the emotion throughout the poem was evident and made the poem unique.