"February" by: Margaret Atwood

February, by Margaret Atwood is one that at first, I was confused by, but now, I feel that I can relate to it in some ways. This poem has one main symbol, the cat, which the speaker uses to symbolize herself. At one point in time, the speaker says that "some other tomcat... has been spraying our front door, declaring war." Like the tomcat, girls often try to "mark" their territory and if another girl attempts to take over, they are declaring social war. After this, the speaker makes a shift from the cat to people in general. She seems to be somewhat pessimistic about love especially when she states that "it's love that does us in." She seems to have had some kind of a negative experience with love. The title of the poem, February somewhat validates this belief because February is a month associated with love, and she seems to dislike this month strongly. At the end, the speaker tells the cat to stop her greedy whining and to get up and have some optimism. This is a call to action for herself as well. She is telling herself to stop being so pessimistic and to go out and find love.