Sylvia Plath
Sylvia Plath
Sylvia Plathwas one of the most renowned and influential poets, novelists, and short story writers of the 20th century. Born in Boston, Massachusetts, she studied at Smith College and Newnham College at the University of Cambridge before receiving acclaim as a poet and writer. She was married to fellow poet Ted Hughes from 1956 until they separated in September of 1962. They lived together in the United States and then the United Kingdom and had two children, Frieda and Nicholas...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth27 October 1932
CountryUnited States of America
There is a charge For the eyeing of my scars, there is a charge For the hearing of my heart - It really goes. And there is a charge, a very large charge, For a word or a touch Or a bit of blood Or a piece of my hair or my clothes.
A ring of gold with the sun in it? Lies. Lies and a grief.
They had to call and call And pick the worms off me like sticky pearls.
O love, how did you get here? --Nick and the Candlestick
In a rabbit-fear I may hurl myself under the wheels of the car because the lights terrify me, and under the dark blind death of wheels I will be safe. I am very tired, very banal, very confused. I do not know who I am tonight. I wanted to walk until I dropped and not complete the inevitable circle of coming home.
I am sure there are things that can't be cured by a good bath but I can't think of one.
God has to remind us this isn't heaven by a long shot, so he increases the radios and lethal flies.
The sun gives you ulcers, the wind gives you T.B. Once you were beautiful.
Now I am silent, hate Up to my neck, Thick, thick. I do not speak.
I am still raw. I say I may be back. You know what lies are for. Even in your Zen heaven we shan't meet.
What did my fingers do before they held him? What did my heart do, with its love?
I started adding up all the things I couldn't do.
I have stitched life into me like a rare organ
I knew chemistry would be worse, because I'd seen a big card of the ninety-odd elements hung up in the chemistry lab, and all the perfectly good words like gold and silver and cobalt and aluminum were shortened to ugly abbreviations with different decimal numbers after them.