۩ ۞ ۝ ♥ The Bed Book ۩ ۝ ۞ ♥

from The Bed Book by Sylvia Plath

Most Beds are Beds
For sleeping or resting,
But the best Beds are much
More interesting!

Not just a white little
Tucked-in-tight little
Nighty-night little
Turn-out-the light little
……….Bed –

………Instead
A Bed for Fishing,
A Bed for Cats,
A Bed for a Troupe of
………Acrobats.

The right sort of Bed
(If you see what I mean)
Is a bed that might
Be a Submarine

Nosing through water
Clear and green,
Silver and glittery
As a sardine.

Or a Jet-Propelled Bed
For visiting Mars
With mosquito nets
For the shooting stars
…................

۝ Mushrooms ۝

۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝

Mushrooms
By Sylvia Plath
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Overnight, very
Whitely, discreetly,
Very quietly

Our toes, our noses
Take hold on the loam,
Acquire the air.

Nobody sees us,
Stops us, betrays us;
The small grains make room.

Soft fists insist on
Heaving the needles,
The leafy bedding,

Even the paving.
Our hammers, our rams,
Earless and eyeless,

Perfectly voiceless,
Widen the crannies,
Shoulder through holes. We

Diet on water,
On crumbs of shadow,
Bland-mannered, asking

Little or nothing.
So many of us!
So many of us!

We are shelves, we are
Tables, we are meek,
We are edible,

Nudgers and shovers
In spite of ourselves.
Our kind multiplies:

We shall by morning
Inherit the earth.
Our foot's in the door.

۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝

۝ By Candlelight ۝

۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝

By Candlelight
By Sylvia Plath
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

This is winter, this is night, small love --
A sort of black horsehair,
A rough, dumb country stuff
Steeled with the sheen
Of what green stars can make it to our gate.
I hold you on my arm.
It is very late.
The dull bells tongue the hour.
The mirror floats us at one candle power.

This is the fluid in which we meet each other,
This haloey radiance that seems to breathe
And lets our shadows wither
Only to blow
Them huge again, violent giants on the wall.
One match scratch makes you real.

At first the candle will not bloom at all --
It snuffs its bud
To almost nothing, to a dull blue dud.

I hold my breath until you creak to life,
Balled hedgehog,
Small and cross. The yellow knife
Grows tall. You clutch your bars.
My singing makes you roar.
I rock you like a boat
Across the Indian carpet, the cold floor,
While the brass man
Kneels, back bent, as best he can

Hefting his white pillar with the light
That keeps the sky at bay,
The sack of black! It is everywhere, tight, tight!
He is yours, the little brassy Atlas --
Poor heirloom, all you have,
At his heels a pile of five brass cannonballs,
No child, no wife.
Five balls! Five bright brass balls!
To juggle with, my love, when the sky falls.

۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝

۝ Child ۝

۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝

Child
By Sylvia Plath
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Your clear eye is the one absolutely beautiful thing.
I want to fill it with color and ducks,
The zoo of the new
Whose name you meditate --
April snowdrop,
Indian pipe,
Little

Stalk without wrinkle,
Pool in which images
Should be grand and classical

Not this troublous
Wringing of hands, this dark
Ceiling without a star.

۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝~۝

۝ Snakecharmer ۝

__________________________________________
Snakecharmer
By Sylvia Plath
*~*~*~*~*~*~*

As the gods began one world, and man another,
So the snakecharmer begins a snaky sphere
With moon-eye, mouth-pipe. He pipes. Pipes green. Pipes water.

Pipes water green until green waters waver
With reedy lengths and necks and undulatings.
And as his notes twine green, the green river

Shapes its images around his songs.
He pipes a place to stand on, but no rocks,
No floor: a wave of flickering grass tongues

Supports his foot. He pipes a world of snakes,
Of sways and coilings, from the snake-rooted bottom
Of his mind. And now nothing but snakes

Is visible. The snake-scales have become
Leaf, become eyelid; snake-bodies, bough, breast
Of tree and human. And he within this snakedom

Rules the writhings which make manifest
His snakehood and his might with pliant tunes
From his thin pipe. Out of this green nest

As out of Eden's navel twist the lines
Of snaky generations: let there be snakes!
And snakes there were, are, will be--till yawns

Consume this piper and he tires of music
And pipes the world back to the simple fabric
Of snake-warp, snake-weft. Pipes the cloth of snakes

To a melting of green waters, till no snake
Shows its head, and those green waters back to
Water, to green, to nothing like a snake.
Puts up his pipe, and lids his moony eye.
__________________________________________

۝ Admonition ۝

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Admonition
By Sylvia Plath
*~*~*~*~*~*~*

If you dissect a bird
To diagram the tongue
You'll cut the chord
Articulating song.

If you flay a beast
To marvel at the mane
You'll wreck the rest
From which the fur began.

If you pluck out the heart
To find what makes it move,
You'll halt the clock
That syncopates our love.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

۩ WORDS ۩

_________________________________

Words
By Sylvia Plath
**************

Axes
After whose stroke the wood rings,
And the echoes!
Echoes traveling
Off from the center like horses.

The sap
Wells like tears, like the
Water striving
To re-establish its mirror
Over the rock

That drops and turns,
A white skull,
Eaten by weedy greens.
Years later I
Encounter them on the road---

Words dry and riderless,
The indefatigable hoof-taps.
While
From the bottom of the pool, fixed stars
Govern a life.
_________________________________

۩ Metaphors ۩

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
.۩ Metaphors ۩

I'm a riddle in nine syllables,
An elephant, a ponderous house,
A melon strolling on two tendrils.
O red fruit, ivory, fine timbers!
This loaf's big with its yeasty rising.
Money's new-minted in this fat purse.
I'm a means, a stage, a cow in calf.
I've eaten a bag of green apples,
Boarded the train there's no getting off.

By Sylvia Plath
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~