Relationships are a part of life; everywhere a person looks, there are relationships and sometimes people are pressured into relationships at the urging of their significant other. Some people say they have that perfect relationship, and others say that they had the perfect relationship, but it has faded overtime. "Living in Sin," by Adrienne Rich, is a poem that serves as a perfect example of how relationships can grow old and leave one wanting something better.
             The first two lines of Rich's poem help to set the tone. When the speaker says, "She had thought the studio would keep itself;/ no dust upon the furniture of love" (1-2). We can see that the character is obviously in a regretful or remorseful mood. She had thought that the initial love would last forever, but now "dust" has fallen upon their relationship. When the character's boyfriend asked her to marry him, she viewed this as a step toward the great American dream. She saw the piano, the shawls, and the other items and wanted that life, but now she is regretting it. The love has faded and there is now a coat of "dust" on her relationship that she cannot remove.
             The reader understands that the character is wondering why she puts up with this relationship because every morning she would wake when at "...five each separate step would writhe/ under the milkman's tramp..." (8-9). She wakes up each morning finding herself listening to the milkman's steps and wanting to be with him. Her relationship with her husband has begun to fade and now she feels the need to find a way out; the milkman serves as a symbol for her way out. She finds herself waking up just so that she can hear the footsteps of the milkman. The character cannot stand to go another day without the attention of her husband.
             Rich makes a clear indication that the character's husband ignores her in lines 15-18 with the st
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