An Analysis of "The Ache of Marriage"
             In "The Ache of Marriage," Denise Levertov attempts to explain the pain this marriage experiences. It is a pain that affects both emotional and physical states of being. Levertov describes the pain as if someone were reading her thoughts. Through Levertov's use of non-conventional form, the theme of the pain of marriage and overcoming that pain jumps from the page.
             The author divides the poem into two parts. On one hand, Levertov shows the difficulty in making a marriage last. She depicts how a marriage can ache and hurt. On the other hand, Levertov says that a blissful marriage as the ultimate goal. All the trial and tribulations a marriage endures prove to be worth it the sacrifices. Through her words, the dichotomy of marriage is personified as an actual human entity. It is a being, which aches in the "thigh and tongue" (2). Levertov's clever use of the literary technique of personification shows how marriage is hard but it can be a beautiful institution if sufficient time and energy are spent to correct what has been damaged.
             The beginning of the poem relates the downsides of marriage. She says, "thigh and tongue, beloved, are heavy with it, it throbs in the teeth" (2-4). This pain affects every part of the body. The use of the verb throb raises the intensity if the pain. The tongue aches because of the endless arguments a marriage experiences. The thighs ache because of the heavy burden pain places upon their shoulders. The turmoil brought upon by this pain makes the marriage suffer. Because this marriage physically causes pain, it may be hard to realize what a blessed thing it is.
             The pain of this marriage results in the ultimate achievement of the objective of marriage. The poem states that all the aches and pains of marriage are worth going through because the love of another is monumental. The husband and wife search in order to heal the pain within each other but cannot f
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