in the strength of her legs, despite her inability to
make them slim, brown, and flawless, in accord
with social and cultural dictates. Fraser is known
as an avant-garde and feminist poet, with both
qualities informing each other as she seeks
to break away from patriarchal modes of com-
munication. ‘‘Poem in Which My Legs Are
Accepted’’ is among Fraser’s earliest works and
provides an interesting blend of experimentation
and convention in her use of form and voice.
Avant-gardeis a French term that means
‘‘leading edge.’’ It does not refer to a specific
style of expression in the arts; the avant-garde,
by definition, is constantly changing. As soon as
something becomes convention and something
else emerges as new and radical, the idea of what
is avant-garde shifts. Fraser has consistently
pushed the edges of what is expected or accept-
able, marking her as an avant-garde, experi-
mental poet. ‘‘Poem in Which My Legs Are
Accepted’’ is unusual, however, because it is
not as stylistically and linguistically adventur-
ous as her later work, nor is it as risky as the
work of other experimentalists writing in the
mid-1960s. At that time, Fraser was still matur-
ing as a writer. Stylistically, the unconventional
line breaks and line lengths were not radical
enough to be considered experimental when
this poem was published in the late 1960s.
Fraser maintained sentence structure and syn-
tax in her line breaks and also preserved a linear
narrative throughout the poem, qualities that
keep this verse firmly in the mainstream.
Thelinestructurein‘‘PoeminWhichMy
Legs Are Accepted’’ is designed not merely to
dress the page and fill it up but more impor-
tantly to communicate disquiet and awkward-
ness through its staggering and breaking. This
uneasiness is especially evident in the first part
of the poem, lines 1 through 41, when Fraser’s
narrator is remembering her adolescence. Her
emotional awkwardness is belied by the fact
that her legs are actually athletic and powerful.
The abrupt line breaks and deep indentations
provide Fraser the opportunity to deliver her
verse with cadence, pauses, and emphases, as
readers are used to experiencing in more formal
poetry with rigid rhyme and meter. An example
of Fraser’s experimentation with cadence and
emphases comes in the description in lines 11
through 13, where the narrator describes her legs
with a few sharp, quick words, which are quick
thrusts at a sore wound. In lines 37 to 40, the
narrator describes the cheerleaders’ legs as look-
ing like bamboo, while the physical arrangement
of these lines on the page resembles horizontal
stalks of bamboo and/or legs.
The end of ‘‘Poem in Which My Legs Are
Accepted,’’ lines 55 to 59, is more experimental
than the rest of the poem because here the words
are visually walking away from the poem. This
takes the author’s use of form from an abstract
conducting of cadence to actual experimentation
of the synergy between form and function. At the
end of the poem, the narrator has documented
her acceptance of her legs, even celebrated them,
and now she prepares to give birth. It is an event
she looks forward to with joy. She is finished
with the pain of her adolescence and wishes to
leave it behind. The single word on line 59, the
last line of the poem, is at the furthest edge of the
page, pushing its way toward the future. This
line structure is symbolic both for the narrator
of the poem and for the child the narrator is
anticipating. In this poem, Fraser’s experimental
elements are subtle but present, as is her feminist
voice.
Feminism is the advocacy of women’s rights
and issues. The feminist message in ‘‘Poem in
Which My Legs Are Accepted’’ is not surprising
considering the virulent era of social reform
from which it arose. The narrator, as an adult
looking back at her adolescence, embraces the
strength and fertility of her body, whatever its
shape, and throws off the expectations of attrac-
tiveness that she learned as a child. This
unabashed love of self and enjoyment of sex
typifies the women’s liberation movement of
the 1960s and 1970s. Women left homemaking
to start careers; they threw out their bras; they
had open, uncommitted relationships with mul-
tiple partners. In Fraser’s poem, the narrator
comes to accept her strong, plump legs and toTHE NARRATOR, AS AN ADULT LOOKING BACKAT HER ADOLESCENCE, EMBRACES THE STRENGTH AND
FERTILITY OF HER BODY, WHATEVER ITS SHAPE, AND
THROWS OFF THE EXPECTATIONS OF ATTRACTIVENESS
THAT SHE LEARNED AS A CHILD.’’
Poem in Which My Legs Are Accepted