The differences I see between these two poems can be found in the speakers. One is a first person speaker and the other is observing, but both are reflecting on the transformation from youth to adulthood. In “Quinceañera” by Judith Ortiz Cofer the speaker is growing up and becoming a woman. She must put away childhood and embrace womanhood. Take the first passage, “My dolls have been put away like dead / children in a chest I will carry / with me when I marry” (lines 1-3). She has just turned fifteen, but in her culture she is now a woman. She must put away her childish things and except that she will contribute to the family as an adult. In her mind she is still a child who plays with dolls and has little and now she must accept the changes