Love Letter -- Sylvia Plath

Guest poem submitted by Anustup Datta:

(Poem #612) Love Letter Not easy to state the change you made. If I'm alive now, then I was dead, Though, like a stone, unbothered by it, Staying put according to habit. You didn't just tow me an inch, no- Nor leave me to set my small bald eye Skyward again, without hope, of course, Of apprehending blueness, or stars. That wasn't it. I slept, say: a snake Masked among black rocks as a black rock In the white hiatus of winter- Like my neighbors, taking no pleasure In the million perfectly-chiseled Cheeks alighting each moment to melt My cheeks of basalt. They turned to tears, Angels weeping over dull natures, But didn't convince me. Those tears froze. Each dead head had a visor of ice. And I slept on like a bent finger. The first thing I was was sheer air And the locked drops rising in dew Limpid as spirits. Many stones lay Dense and expressionless round about. I didn't know what to make of it. I shone, mice-scaled, and unfolded To pour myself out like a fluid Among bird feet and the stems of plants. I wasn't fooled. I knew you at once. Tree and stone glittered, without shadows. My finger-length grew lucent as glass. I started to bud like a March twig: An arm and a leg, and arm, a leg. From stone to cloud, so I ascended. Now I resemble a sort of god Floating through the air in my soul-shift Pure as a pane of ice. It's a gift. -- Sylvia Plath

A very different sort of love poem, but great reading nevertheless. I like
the beautiful matter-of-fact way in which Plath attempts to describe the
tumultuous love of her life - as though she were a dispassionate observer
looking at the wondrous changes in herself from the outside. It is as though
her love is so intense that it would sweep away all her reason (and rhyme)
if she gave way to it. Hence the documentary style carefully repressing
emotion, which shines through doubly reinforced because of this very
restraint. The last sentence is magical:

        Now I resemble a sort of god
        Floating through the air in my soul-shift
        Pure as a pane of ice. It's a gift.

Anustup.