In the poem “35/10” by Sharon Olds, the speaker uses nostalgic and jealous tones to express her feelings regarding her daughter's coming of age. The speaker, a thirty-five-year-old woman, realizes that as the door to womanhood opens for her ten-year-old daughter, it begins to close for her. A melancholy tone is used when the speaker calls herself "the silver-haired servant" (4) behind her daughter, indicating that she wishes to be not the servant, but the served. Referring to herself as her daughter's servant indicates a sense of self-awareness in the speaker. She feels that her power is weakening and that of her daughter is strengthening. It also shows nostalgia for his waning youth and sadness for his advancing years. That melancholy tone appears again when she asks, "Why do they start to come, the crook of my neck thinning as the thin bones of its hips sharpen?" (4-7). She demands an explanation as to why she has to age. She is jealous that while her daughter is on the threshold of puberty, becoming more beautiful, she is on the threshold of middle age, b...