Hart is a freelance writer of literary themes. In this essay, she examines the ambiguity of the images in Clifton's poem and considers them as the meditations of one woman reflecting on her life, who, through the use of ambiguity, speaks to everyone.

At first reading, Lucille Clifton's poem "Climbing" seems to be made up of simple, seemingly non-complex words and fairly obvious images. Consisting of only twelve lines that create a single image of a woman climbing a metaphorical rope of time, "Climbing" could be read in a couple of minutes, smiled at, and then forgotten. But Clifton is a complicated woman, whose use of simple vocabulary and short-lined verse is not an indication of simple meaning or lack of depth. As Liz Rosenberg in her article in the New York Times puts it: "[W]hat may appear stylistically simple [in Clifton's poetry] is, upon close...