The Convent Threshold

The speaker begins her dramatic monologue [see Literary Devices] with a shocking declaration that “[t]here’s blood between” herself and her audience, whom she calls her “love” (Line 1). By stating that blood connects them, the speaker seems to be describing her first sexual encounter. Yet the next line uses the image of blood differently to describe the judgment of familial relationships. Because there is “father’s blood” and “brother’s blood” (Line 2), the speaker believes there is “a bar” that she “cannot pass” (Line 3). This suggests that their families do not approve of their relationship.

The speaker wants to now make a new, better choice, as she chooses “the stairs that mount above” (Line 4). These stairs symbolize her choice to commit to her Christian faith as she takes “[s]tair after golden skyward stair” (Line 5). She hopes to reach the “city” (Line 6), a reference to heaven, and a “sea of glass” (Line 6). This phrase appears in Revelations 4:6, where God’s throne is in a sea of glass.

This journey is for the speaker to purify her soul. Her formerly “lily feet are soiled with mud” (Line 7).