two for | Barricades

"How long can I be a wall around my green property?
How long can my hands
Be a bandage to his hurt, and my words
Bright birds in the sky, consoling, consoling?
It is a terrible thing
To be so open: it is as if my heart
Put on a face and walked into the world."

from Sylvia Plath's Three Women


Sylvia attended Smith college, just down the street from my house here in Northampton. Some days - like today, when the humidity brings everything to a heavy and damp stillness - I like to walk the grounds and think of her. Heavy and damp.

(photos) on film with Leica CL | Smith College (p.s) another one of daffodils on my Flickr. 

10 comments:

  1. I feel I need to mull all these words over a few times, and then again.

    Beautifully put.

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  2. I love that. "It is as if my heart put on a face and walked into the world." Beautiful!

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  3. She changed me. It's because of her, I left home and traveled and dreamed bigger. And then started writing. Beautiful post.

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    1. Tiffany, I didn't really start reading her until this winter break, and I so wished someone would have nudged me toward her when I was in undergrad! A small town girl at private college, dealing with a lot of feelings? she got me!

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  4. 'put on a face and walk into the world' - can't say more.

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  5. So beautiful. Now I've finished university and my reading is my own once more, I'd like to read some Sylvia Plath. Also, just wanted you to know how head over heels I am for your blog. It's so beautiful, and so intelligent. I love it. x

    www.ciderwithrosiebee.blogspot.com

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    1. Rosie, I've been enjoying the same luxury, now that summer is (finally!) here. Ms. Sylvia wrote mostly poems, but her one complete novel "The Bell Jar" is so spot on and smart. I read it over winter break and really recommend it. Maggie Gyllenhaal actually just recorded the audio book! Doesn't that sound like a great combination?

      And, thank you for your kind words. They mean so much.

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  6. I love Sylvia so much. I even have a Sylvia tattoo! I'm currently reading "The Silent Woman, Sylvia Plath & Ted Hughes" by Janet Malcolm and it's one of the best books I've read in a long time. I highly recommend it!

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    1. Amanda, I was a little late to the scene of Sylvia - just having read her for this first time earlier this year. She connected me back to a part of myself that I've (somewhat deliberately) lost as I've grown older - that messy, deep feeling core. For that, I am grateful. Thanks for the biography recommendation, I'd love to know more about her life than the things I've heard in legend. Also, tell me about your tattoo?

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Thank you so much for commenting, Darling Reader! I read + love each and every one of them. (Anonymous commenting has been turned off due to robots)

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