It happens. Will it go on? ---- <br />My mind a rock, <br />No fingers to grip, no tongue, <br />My god the iron lung <br /> <br />That loves me, pumps <br />My two <br />Dust bags in and out, <br />Will not <br /> <br />Let me relapse <br />While the day outside glides by like ticker tape. <br />The night brings violets, <br />Tapestries of eyes, <br /> <br />Lights, <br />The soft anonymous <br />Talkers: 'You all right?' <br />The starched, inaccessible breast. <br /> <br />Dead egg, I lie <br />Whole <br />On a whole world I cannot touch, <br />At the white, tight <br /> <br />Drum of my sleeping couch <br />Photographs visit me- <br />My wife, dead and flat, in 1920 furs, <br />Mouth full of pearls, <br /> <br />Two girls <br />As flat as she, who whisper 'We're your daughters.' <br />The still waters <br />Wrap my lips, <br /> <br />Eyes, nose and ears, <br />A clear <br />Cellophane I cannot crack. <br />On my bare back <br /> <br />I smile, a buddha, all <br />Wants, desire <br />Falling from me like rings <br />Hugging their lights. <br /> <br />The claw <br />Of the magnolia, <br />Drunk on its own scents, <br />Asks nothing of life.<br /><br />Sylvia Plath<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/paralytic/
