Monologue for an Onion by Suji Kwock Kim

Poetry is a wonderful vehicle for layering meaning through metaphor.  Kim, in “Monologue for an Onion” uses the simple action of peeling onion as a metaphor for complex and hurtful relationships between people.  She artfully weaves images and meaning between the action and the relationship it stands for.

Generally, a metaphor is a comparison between two unlike things.  In this poem, the speaker is represented as an onion, which represents a person who is being victimized by the one who is cutting up the onion, the peeler.  This is the basic metaphor, but the levels go even deeper.  The metaphor is the action of peeling the onion by, presumably, another person.  This other person is the one with whom onion is in a relationship.  The action of the poem depicts the final confrontation in the relationship which ends in the tragic destruction of the onion.  It is as if the peeler, one person, actually consumes the other.

First, the onion itself represents a person who is being torn apart or torn down. The first person point of view is that of the onion.  On the surface, the onion is apologizing for making the peeler cry.  Most people will tear up when peeling an onion from the acid it emits.  However, in this case, the onion is making an apology to the peeler for causing this reaction, though it can be interpreted as less than sincere.

Like the onion, this first person speaker has several layers of herself that remain, for the most part and by her own choice, hidden from others’ view.  Only those that get close to the onion can get to know her innermost layers.  However, in this poem, the person whom the onion represents is being made to forcibly reveal her innermost layers to the peeler before she is ready.  She accuses the peeler from “…peeling away my body, layer by layer,” (line 3).  The relationship between these two individuals is of utmost importance when analyzing the poem’s presentation of the metaphor.

According to the speaker, the peeler is intent on reaching the innermost part of her being.  Onions are composed of many layers and anyone who has peeled them apart layer by layer knows what a lengthy task that is.  The speaker knows what it is that the peeler seeks; “Poor deluded human:  you seek my heart” (line 6).  The speaker is clearly not ready to reveal her “secret core” which she claims to be a “pure union of outside and in” (line 5-6).

It should be noted that union and onion differ by only one letter, possible indicating that the speaker feels at one with herself and her being and that the peeler is seeking a union, or oneness, with her by force.  Most people understand the love and pure, truthful emotions is not something that can be forced. This insistence by the peeler, and the references to blades and cutting actions reflect their violent and abusive relationship.

The attitude of the peeler is very obviously one of frustration.  He has resorted to “chopping” and “slashing” as the poem progresses.  His intent is focused on getting to the core of his partner before she is ready to let him.  Here, the tears are not from the acid of the onion, but from her acidic refusal to let him get close to her. He is the type of individual that won’t take no for an answer.  He wants all of her, immediately, and is willing to resort to violence in order to get it.

Though the reasons are not explicitly stated as to why she is not willing to allow him into her heart, her scorn for his attempts are obvious.  Her apology in the opening lines does not seem heartfelt, but rather sarcastic.  After all, would an onion apologize to the one that was tearing it apart?  Probably not.  Therefore, the apology is more than likely bitter.  She wants him to share the pain that she is feeling by his constant probing, by his “blade of fresh desire” (line 26) by his hunger “to know where meaning/Lies” (lines 20-21).

However, one could also respond that many times the abused person in a relationship is made to feel like the violence was caused by her, that she made her partner anger.  In this case, the onion might have actually apologized in the past, but she is clearly at the end of her proverbial rope now.  She uses insults to refer to him, such as “poor deluded human” (line 6), “Idiot” (line 10), and “poor fool” (line 28).  She is no longer willing to allow this intrusion, this violence.  She says “Enough is enough” (line 15).  She does this even even if it means her own demise.

The attitude of the onion, the speaker, is one of coldness, as if she really were an inanimate object.  Perhaps this pattern has repeated itself to the point that she is immune.  She does not beg or plead for him to stop, but chastises him for seeking something that he will never be able to find.  She calls his search a “fantasy” (line 12) and him a person who is “lost in a maze of chambers, blood and love” (line 29).  This is a metaphor within a metaphor because, ironically, she is describing him as a heart, which is exactly what he is seeking from her.  She, however, has tired of his senseless, emotionally draining, and possibly even violent demands for her entire being.  She offers herself up as a sacrifice, a martyr even, but never lets him into her core.

The two individuals for which the peeling an onion metaphor are unique.  The onion is a person who has many aspects to herself, many of which she simply reserves for herself. She does not delude herself that true love or perfection exists.  She comments that “You must not grieve that the world is glimpsed/Through veils.  How else can it be seen?”  (lines 16-17), meaning that everyone looks at others through their own glasses.  Their sight will different based upon those glasses or veils.  She understands this and refuses to give in to a society which is demanding that she be an open book.

The partner, lover, in this poem does believe in these fantasies and is insisting that the speaker conform to this belief as well.  All the while he is violently attempting to plunder her soul, he is weeping.  Why?  The speaker surmises that he is weeping because he realizes deep down that his quest will be futile.  She offers that “ruin and tears your only signs of progress” (line 14-15).  All he has of her heart after his savage attack is “onion juice/Yellow peels, my stinging shreds” (lines 21-22) which are not signs of love and union, even though the peeler may rather have the onion’s “blood’ rather than nothing.

The peeler, then, is really the one in pieces, not the onion.  The onion knows who she is and is secure in herself.  The peeler is the one “divided at the heart” (line 28).  She accuses him of forcing love, of not understanding love, and of not being true to himself, if he knows how to be true to himself:  “You are the one/In pieces.  Whatever you meant to love, in meaning to /You changed yourself: you are not who you are” (line 23-24).

This poem creates a metaphor which compares peeling an onion to the destruction of a relationship between two individuals.  One of them is secret and the other demanding.  This combination can never last.  In the poem, the end is violent, ending with the “death” of the onion.  Sadly, all too many relationships end up this way.  Kim brilliantly uses this metaphor to portray the destructiveness of this type of relationship.