I think that the central purpose of this poem is that the speaker is trying to raise awareness about girls' self-esteem and self-image. Society tells people that they should be a certain way; so since people become wrapped in pleasing others, they fall into the tide of society's wants and desires. However, I believe that the speaker is trying to tell the "barbie doll" that she should not change herself for someone else. She died on their terms of beauty, but society doesn't know what beauty really is. Society thinks that beauty consists of revealing tops, lots of make-up, orange skin, and plastic surgery. This is not beauty: this is being fake. Beauty is a beautiful light that comes from within, but society made the girl's "beauty" light burn out.
The tone of the poem is mournful over the girl's death. It's also kind of condescending towards society for doing this to the girl. The diction is melancholy towards how wonderful the girl's life once used to be. As the poem goes on, the speaker uses words that are almost disappointed that the girl was not strong enough to be her own person. For instance, the writer says, "she cut off her nose and her legs and offered them up.... she lay with the understaker's cosmetics painted on, a turned up nose, dressed in a pink and white nightie." Yes, the writer is using diction that the woman looks beautiful but in a different way. The woman basically caved in to the wants and desires of society by cutting off her nose and her legs. A symbol in the poem is that the "cutting off of her nose" represents the material desires of the world that drown the heart of society. I found it ironic that the girl "was healthy and tested intelligent" when later she lay in the casket, completely sick from the temptations and destruction of society.
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