A dream tree, Polly's tree: <br />a thicket of sticks, <br />each speckled twig <br /> <br />ending in a thin-paned <br />leaf unlike any <br />other on it <br /> <br />or in a ghost flower <br />flat as paper and <br />of a color <br /> <br />vaporish as frost-breath, <br />more finical than <br />any silk fan <br /> <br />the Chinese ladies use <br />to stir robin's egg <br />air. The silver - <br /> <br />haired seed of the milkweed <br />comes to roost there, frail <br />as the halo <br /> <br />rayed round a candle flame, <br />a will-o'-the-wisp <br />nimbus, or puff <br /> <br />of cloud-stuff, tipping her <br />queer candelabrum. <br />Palely lit by <br /> <br />snuff-ruffed dandelions, <br />white daisy wheels and <br />a tiger faced <br /> <br />pansy, it glows. O it's <br />no family tree, <br />Polly's tree, nor <br /> <br />a tree of heaven, though <br />it marry quartz-flake, <br />feather and rose. <br /> <br />It sprang from her pillow <br />whole as a cobweb <br />ribbed like a hand, <br /> <br />a dream tree. Polly's tree <br />wears a valentine <br />arc of tear-pearled <br /> <br />bleeding hearts on its sleeve <br />and, crowning it, one <br />blue larkspur star.<br /><br />Sylvia Plath<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/polly-s-tree/
