{"id":91103,"date":"2020-10-27T05:30:57","date_gmt":"2020-10-27T09:30:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/?p=91103"},"modified":"2021-10-26T14:42:05","modified_gmt":"2021-10-26T18:42:05","slug":"do-i-terrify","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/?p=91103","title":{"rendered":"\u201cDo I terrify?\u201d — Sylvia Plath"},"content":{"rendered":"

Yes, Sylvia. You do.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

It’s her birthday today. She always hated her birthdays. <\/p>\n

Reading the recently published two-volume full correspondence of Plath was an absolute eye-opener for this lifelong fan. Finally: light from the caves! One of the many revelations in those pages was what a massive movie fan Plath was. I never knew! I wrote about it in my column at Film Comment: Sylvia Plath Goes to the Movies<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Here’s a draft of “Stings,” written in the month of October, 1962, the productive (understatement) month when she wrote many of the poems that would make her name (posthumously). It’s written on the back of pink Smith College stationery (her alma mater).<\/p>\n

\"original-draft-of-sylvia-plath_s-poem-e2809cstingse2809d\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\nHere’s the final poem:<\/p>\n

Stings<\/big><\/p>\n

Bare-handed, I hand the combs.
\nThe man in white smiles, bare-handed,
\nOur cheesecloth gauntlets neat and sweet,
\nThe throats of our wrists brave lilies.
\nHe and I<\/p>\n

Have a thousand clean cells between us,
\nEight combs of yellow cups,
\nAnd the hive itself a teacup,
\nWhite with pink flowers on it,
\nWith excessive love I enameled it<\/p>\n

Thinking “Sweetness, sweetness.”
\nBrood cells gray as the fossils of shells
\nTerrify me, they seem so old.
\nWhat am I buying, wormy mahogany?
\nIs there any queen at all in it?<\/p>\n

If there is, she is old,
\nHer wings torn shawls, her long body
\nRubbed of its plush\u2014
\nPoor and bare and unqueenly and even shameful.
\nI stand in a column<\/p>\n

Of winged, unmiraculous women,
\nHoney-drudgers.
\nI am no drudge
\nThough for years I have eaten dust
\nAnd dried plates with my dense hair.<\/p>\n

And seen my strangeness evaporate,
\nBlue dew from dangerous skin.
\nWill they hate me,
\nThese women who only scurry,
\nWhose news is the open cherry, the open clover?<\/p>\n

It is almost over.
\nI am in control.
\nHere is my honey-machine,
\nIt will work without thinking,
\nOpening, in spring, like an industrious virgin<\/p>\n

To scour the creaming crests
\nAs the moon, for its ivory powders, scours the sea.
\nA third person is watching.
\nHe has nothing to do with the bee-seller or with me.
\nNow he is gone<\/p>\n

In eight great bounds, a great scapegoat.
\nHere is his slipper, here is another,
\nAnd here the square of white linen
\nHe wore instead of a hat.
\nHe was sweet,<\/p>\n

The sweat of his efforts a rain
\nTugging the world to fruit.
\nThe bees found him out,
\nMolding onto his lips like lies,
\nComplicating his features.<\/p>\n

They thought death was worth it, but I
\nHave a self to recover, a queen.
\nIs she dead, is she sleeping?
\nWhere has she been,
\nWith her lion-red body, her wings of glass?<\/p>\n

Now she is flying
\nMore terrible than she ever was, red
\nScar in the sky, red comet
\nOver the engine that killed her\u2014
\nThe mausoleum, the wax house.<\/p>\n

In October and November of 1962, she worked at a literally insane pace, and the phenomenal part of it is that she did not just toss off drafts carelessly. She worked<\/em> these poems, bringing each one through multiple drafts, paring down, re-writing, re-organizing. (There is an entire book written about the revising process of the Ariel<\/i> poems: Revising Life: Sylvia Plath’s Ariel Poems<\/a>\"\"<\/i>). <\/p>\n

There is a myth that the Ariel<\/i> poems represented a burst of creativity, but that is a misunderstanding of what creativity is all about. Creativity really means work<\/em>. <\/p>\n

\n\"sylvia1\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\nIt’s incorrect to assume that the “bee sequence” poems, or “Lady Lazarus”, or “Ariel”, “Daddy”, “Fever 103”, her most famous poems now, were only the result of a manic and wild despair brought on by the dissolution of her marriage. Yes, she was not sleeping, and, yes, she would stay up through the night working on these poems. Sleep deprivation can intensify mania\/depression. But as anyone who has experienced it knows, mania can be extremely<\/i> productive. Beethoven, in his manic phases, composed at a similar white-hot pace. When the mania subsided, depression came, and the leveling-out of moods that go along with that. And in that quieter state, he would look at what he had composed earlier, and start the editing process. It was depression that helped him edit out what didn’t work. A similar cycling may have been happening with Plath, although I find mental health speculations pretty distasteful and over-simplifying the matter. This is merely a defense of some of the BENEFITS of the manic\/depressive cycle: productive\/get the work out and then calmer mood\/edit down what was written before. (Got this idea from Kay Jemison’s Touched by Fire<\/i>, an excellent – and hugely controversial – book about the connection between bipolar\/mood disorders and creativity.) I am going on like this because it is insulting to Plath’s great art to assume that every word was the dashed-off result of a nervous breakdown.<\/p>\n

She had the impulse, the inspiration, and she also maintained the cool-headed eye of the editor, slashing out stuff that didn’t work. She only had a couple of months left to live. There’s a beautiful and strange irony of seeing the drafts of these poems written in white-hot fury, appearing on the pink stationery of the college that had tried to turn her into a nice and socially acceptable young lady.<\/p>\n

\n\"lameyer_00004-high-res.tiff<\/a><\/p>\n

If you read Sylvia Plath’s poems chronologically (from the beginning, I’m talking, from before her first published collection The Colossus and Other Poems<\/a>\"\"<\/i>), it does seem that the October\/November 1962 poems come from somebody else: an entirely new person is now speaking. You can read this chronological progression in The Collected Poems<\/a>\"\"<\/i>.<\/p>\n

She always had talent, although perhaps a bit arch and precocious with it at the start. Ted Hughes gave us the image of Plath composing a poem, Thesaurus balanced on her knee. You can feel the Thesaurus’ presence in those earlier poems. She did not gallop out of the gate a full-blown Genius. You can feel how hard she works. <\/p>\n

Her talent burst into full-form seemingly suddenly<\/i> in the fall of 1962. You can feel<\/i> it happen when you read her poems in order. She knew it, too. “These poems will make my name,” she declared. Many of her friends were frightened by the poems she wrote at that time. They are among the most ominous poems ever written, the “Gimme Shelter” of poetry. <\/p>\n

\n\"CAQLwRYVIAAjgLf\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Although it is useless to speculate I have often wondered: if London hadn’t gone into a deep freeze in December 1962, leaving her isolated and freezing, with two babies to care for, no one to help her, would she have found the strength to make it through? Plath had tried to kill herself before. It was always her trump card. She kept that option open. But her domestic problems in that winter, frozen pipes, the sheer difficulty<\/i> of day-to-day existence, didn’t help. <\/p>\n

Late that fall, she read some of her poems on BBC Radio (“Lady Lazarus”, above, being one of them). Here she is reading “Daddy”, her most famous poem.<\/p>\n

<\/param><\/param><\/param><\/embed><\/object><\/p>\n

\nI find her voice hair-raising. <\/p>\n

Fever 103<\/big> (another October 1962 poem)<\/p>\n

Pure? What does it mean?
\nThe tongues of hell
\nAre dull, dull as the triple<\/p>\n

Tongues of dull, fat Cerebus
\nWho wheezes at the gate. Incapable
\nOf licking clean<\/p>\n

The aguey tendon, the sin, the sin.
\nThe tinder cries.
\nThe indelible smell<\/p>\n

Of a snuffed candle!
\nLove, love, the low smokes roll
\nFrom me like Isadora\u2019s scarves, I\u2019m in a fright<\/p>\n

One scarf will catch and anchor in the wheel.
\nSuch yellow sullen smokes
\nMake their own element. They will not rise,<\/p>\n

But trundle round the globe
\nChoking the aged and the meek,
\nThe weak<\/p>\n

Hothouse baby in its crib,
\nThe ghastly orchid
\nHanging its hanging garden in the air,<\/p>\n

Devilish leopard!
\nRadiation turned it white
\nAnd killed it in an hour.<\/p>\n

Greasing the bodies of adulterers
\nLike Hiroshima ash and eating in.
\nThe sin. The sin.<\/p>\n

Darling, all night
\nI have been flickering, off, on, off, on.
\nThe sheets grow heavy as a lecher\u2019s kiss.<\/p>\n

Three days. Three nights.
\nLemon water, chicken
\nWater, water make me retch.<\/p>\n

I am too pure for you or anyone.
\nYour body
\nHurts me as the world hurts God. I am a lantern \u2014<\/p>\n

My head a moon
\nOf Japanese paper, my gold beaten skin
\nInfinitely delicate and infinitely expensive.<\/p>\n

Does not my heat astound you. And my light.
\nAll by myself I am a huge camellia
\nGlowing and coming and going, flush on flush.<\/p>\n

I think I am going up,
\nI think I may rise \u2014
\nThe beads of hot metal fly, and I, love, I<\/p>\n

Am a pure acetylene
\nVirgin
\nAttended by roses,<\/p>\n

By kisses, by cherubim,
\nBy whatever these pink things mean.
\nNot you, nor him.<\/p>\n

Not him, nor him
\n(My selves dissolving, old whore petticoats) \u2014
\nTo Paradise.<\/p>\n

\n\"sylvia<\/a><\/p>\n

\nIn honor of her birthday, here\u2019s one she actually wrote about her birthday in 1962. She wrote this poem, now one of her most well-known, on Sept. 30 1962. <\/p>\n

A Birthday Present<\/big><\/p>\n

What is this, behind this veil, is it ugly, is it beautiful?
\nIt is shimmering, has it breasts, has it edges?<\/p>\n

I am sure it is unique, I am sure it is what I want.
\nWhen I am quiet at my cooking I feel it looking, I feel it thinking<\/p>\n

\u2018Is this the one I am too appear for,
\nIs this the elect one, the one with black eye-pits and a scar?<\/p>\n

Measuring the flour, cutting off the surplus,
\nAdhering to rules, to rules, to rules.<\/p>\n

Is this the one for the annunciation?
\nMy god, what a laugh!\u2019<\/p>\n

But it shimmers, it does not stop, and I think it wants me.
\nI would not mind if it were bones, or a pearl button.<\/p>\n

I do not want much of a present, anyway, this year.
\nAfter all I am alive only by accident.<\/p>\n

I would have killed myself gladly that time any possible way.
\nNow there are these veils, shimmering like curtains,<\/p>\n

The diaphanous satins of a January window
\nWhite as babies\u2019 bedding and glittering with dead breath. O ivory!<\/p>\n

It must be a tusk there, a ghost column.
\nCan you not see I do not mind what it is.<\/p>\n

Can you not give it to me?
\nDo not be ashamed\u2013I do not mind if it is small.<\/p>\n

Do not be mean, I am ready for enormity.
\nLet us sit down to it, one on either side, admiring the gleam,<\/p>\n

The glaze, the mirrory variety of it.
\nLet us eat our last supper at it, like a hospital plate.<\/p>\n

I know why you will not give it to me,
\nYou are terrified<\/p>\n

The world will go up in a shriek, and your head with it,
\nBossed, brazen, an antique shield,<\/p>\n

A marvel to your great-grandchildren.
\nDo not be afraid, it is not so.<\/p>\n

I will only take it and go aside quietly.
\nYou will not even hear me opening it, no paper crackle,<\/p>\n

No falling ribbons, no scream at the end.
\nI do not think you credit me with this discretion.<\/p>\n

If you only knew how the veils were killing my days.
\nTo you they are only transparencies, clear air.<\/p>\n

But my god, the clouds are like cotton.
\nArmies of them. They are carbon monoxide.<\/p>\n

Sweetly, sweetly I breathe in,
\nFilling my veins with invisibles, with the million<\/p>\n

Probable motes that tick the years off my life.
\nYou are silver-suited for the occasion. O adding machine\u2014\u2013<\/p>\n

Is it impossible for you to let something go and have it go whole?
\nMust you stamp each piece purple,<\/p>\n

Must you kill what you can?
\nThere is one thing I want today, and only you can give it to me.<\/p>\n

It stands at my window, big as the sky.
\nIt breathes from my sheets, the cold dead center<\/p>\n

Where split lives congeal and stiffen to history.
\nLet it not come by the mail, finger by finger.<\/p>\n

Let it not come by word of mouth, I should be sixty
\nBy the time the whole of it was delivered, and to numb to use it.<\/p>\n

Only let down the veil, the veil, the veil.
\nIf it were death<\/p>\n

I would admire the deep gravity of it, its timeless eyes.
\nI would know you were serious.<\/p>\n

There would be a nobility then, there would be a birthday.
\nAnd the knife not carve, but enter<\/p>\n

Pure and clean as the cry of a baby,
\nAnd the universe slide from my side.<\/p>\n

\n\"tumblr_nv6ysb7Ola1usywzbo1_500\"<\/a><\/p>\n

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Yes, Sylvia. You do. It’s her birthday today. She always hated her birthdays. Reading the recently published two-volume full correspondence of Plath was an absolute eye-opener for this lifelong fan. Finally: light from the caves! One of the many revelations … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[15,39,9],"tags":[88],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91103"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=91103"}],"version-history":[{"count":16,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91103\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":171611,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91103\/revisions\/171611"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=91103"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=91103"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=91103"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}