Rita Hayworth in a “Gilda” negligee from 1945
The Young Housewife
At ten AM the young housewife
moves about in negligee behind
the wooden walls of her husband’s house.
I pass solitary in my car.
Then again she comes to the curb
to call the ice-man, fish-man, and stands
shy, uncorseted, tucking in
stray ends of hair, and I compare her
to a fallen leaf.
The noiseless wheels of my car
rush with a crackling sound over
dried leaves as I bow and pass smiling.
In this poem William Carlos Williams explores sexual fantasy mingling with social constraint. This constraint hinders both the narrator and the housewife. Here’s why:
The poem, at face value, just outlines a typical morning. A doctor is driving through a neighborhood, probably to make a house call. A woman is going about her home in negligee and she retrieves a few items from deliverymen. The deeper meaning can be found through Williams’ use of double entendre, careful choice of words, and enjambment.
The wording is key because of what it implies. For example, “… behind/ the wooden walls of her husband’s house…” William’s doesn’t say her house, but her husband’s, which seems to say that she doesn’t identify with the home and is kept behind the walls of that unfamiliar abode. It’s 10 AM, so her husband is probably working, leaving her alone. Meanwhile the narrator is passing solitarily in his car. Here’s the first sign of a link between the two characters: she alone in her home, he alone in his car, both of them held back by something.
My favorite stanza in this poem is the second one because of the brilliant play on words through enjambment. This stanza starts off by saying, “Then again she comes to the curb/ to call the ice-man, fish-man, and stands…” On one hand the woman walks up to the curb (another constraint) and gathers items from a delivery. However, these two lines also hint at the possibility of prostitution. “…again she comes… to call the ice-man, fish-man…” She’s standing at the curb… See where I’m going with this? Then, the reader finds out she is “uncorseted” and unkempt with her “stray ends of hair…” which really just further proves my point. If the poem is read without acknowledging the enjambment it just seems like Williams is describing what’s going on, but if the reader gives each line it’s own authority, the meaning changes.
Finally, we learn that the narrator associates the housewife with a “fallen leaf.” Then, in a seemingly bizarre divergence from the rest of the poem the narrator drives off crushing “dried leaves” as he bows and passes. This divergence is actually a calculated move by Williams. It means to say that the woman, in all of her beautiful glory, is still bound by societal expectations and constraints which will eventually suck the vibrancy out of her, making her fall from the tree, which will cause her to lifeless, therefore dried, and all the while Williams drives on knowing it was a fleeting sexual fantasy anyway.
Superb close reading. For such a simple poem, there is so much going on here. I like how you pick up on the whiff of prostitution, and also the seeming violence at the end where the leaves are crushed beneath his car. The poem certainly veers towards misogyny as it revels in the male gaze–its ability to secure a fantasy and just as easy leave it wilting behind as the good doctor moves on to the next house call.