Women who are dominated by their husbands live their lives in a state of mental confinement. In the poem "Aunt Jennifer's Tigers," the poet Adrienne Rich expresses the life Aunt Jennifer wishes to lead through artistic creations as she is trapped in an abusive marriage. Her tapestries portray her inner feelings conveying the constant terror she's living in. The only way for Aunt Jennifer to escape the expectations of her husband is to live on, after death, through her artwork.
             The tigers in Aunt Jennifer's needlework symbolize her longing for freedom. She is expressing her pain through art, creating a picture of how she'd like her own life to be. The tigers are not scared of men, as Aunt Jennifer fears her husband; they are powerful and brave animals. "They do not fear the men beneath the tree." The tigers display values such as strength and fearlessness that Aunt Jennifer evidently lacks. The tigers "pace in sleek Chivalric certainty," indicating that Aunt Jennifer has never been treated with special courtesy or gentlemanliness by her husband, therefore creating chivalry in her tigers. In her needlework, the tigers are described as 'prancing, proud and unafraid," attributes that Aunt Jennifer deeply desire.
             Aunt Jennifer has been living her life in fear of her controlling husband. The "massive weight of Uncles wedding band," is not the actual ring that places this "weight" upon her, but the life that has become as a result of Aunt Jennifer's accepting of the ring. Her "terrified hands" show that her husband terrorizes her. She is "mastered" by him," as if she's his prisoner under his control and ruling. Aunt Jennifer's husband is in fact her owner. She couldn't escape this lifestyle because in this time, society supported the marriage and these types of gender roles. The abuse Aunt Jennifer endured wa
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