by Sylvia Plath
Perfection is terrible, it cannot have children.
Cold as snow breath, it tamps the womb
Where the yew trees blow like hydras,
The tree of life and the tree of life
Unloosing their moons, month after month, to no purpose.
The blood flood is the flood of love,
The absolute sacrifice.
It means no more idols but me,
Me and you.
So, in their sulphur loveliness, in their smiles
These mannequins lean tonight
In Munich, morgue between Paris and Rome,
Naked and bald in their turs,
Orange lollies on silver sacks.
Intolerable, without mind.
The snow drops its pieces of darkness,
Nobody’s about. In the hotels
Hands will be opening doors and setting
Down shoes for a polish of carbon
Into which broad toes will go tomorrow.
O the domesticity of these windows,
The baby lace, the green leaved confectionary,
The thick Germans slumbering in their bottomless Stoiz.
And the black phones on hooks
Glittering
Glittering and digesting
Voicelessness. The snow has no voice.