Lesbian Love Motif
A number of Behn's poems involve romantic attraction and love between women that begins as a friendship but extends to something more. The main example of this is in her lesbian love poem To the fair Clarinda, who made Love to me, imagin'd more than woman. She asserts that there is no such thing as masculine, no such thing as feminine, there is just an androgynous Clarinda, whose feminine side offers friendship and whose masculine side offers sexual attraction. Love between women is, by definition, innocent, and therefore not subject to the censure of a love between the sexes.
In the poem, Clarinda is the romantic aggressor and this is believed to represent a love between Behn and a female lover. The speaker (Behn) responds to these advances justifying her own sexuality to the public who might find her sexual ambivalence improper.
Friendship Between Women Motif
There is really no competition of conflict in Behn's poetry between women. The women she writes about do not fight over a romantic interest, or show jealousy when a man they like is interested in somebody else. The nearest her poems come to having one woman wanting the man of another is in Lady Morland at Tunbridge, when Behn, as the speaker, tells her friend Carola that even though they are rivals attracted to the same lover, Behn still respects and admires her. Because she loves her dearly she warns her about taking her lover because he is experienced, and apt to leave without warning. Carola, she believes, deserves someone who is innocent, and sincere, and who will not leave her for another. There are many such examples of women advising and protecting other women from heartache, showing a sort of Restoration girl power that aligns the females against the males in many of Behn's poems.
Astrea Symbol
The speaker of the poem is usually a female character named Astrea. This is a symbol of Behn herself; when she was working for the king as a spy in Europe, she went by the name Astrea, and so using this as the speaker's name is symbolic not only of her identity but also of the fact that she is in some ways still a spy, watching her social circle for subject matter for her poems and writing about the day to day happenings within her group.
Dismay Symbol
In The Reflection, the female is bereft because the man to whom she gave her virginity and her honor is now disinterested in her. She is dismayed, which is symbolic of her actual condition in life. She has been dis-maid, in the old fashioned meaning of the world. She is now without her maidenhood because she is no longer a virgin, and will therefore not be considered by future suitors.
Banking and Business Symbols
In "To Lysander, on some Verses he writ, and asking more for his Heart than 'twas worth," Behn uses banking and business terms to symbolize Lysander's materialism and the way in which he prioritizes money over all else. The speaker tells him to take his heart back, because she has to pay too high of a price to him in order to have it. The barter and exchange system that the poem describes symbolizes the way in which Lysander is cheating the speaker and not giving her what has been promised by their transaction.
