"Before they came the air was calm enough,
Coming and going, breath by breath, without any fuss.
Then the tulips filled it up like a loud noise.
Now the air snags and eddies round them the way a river....."
(excerpt from "Tulips" by Sylvia Plath)
This via Buzzfeed via Brain Pickings. Sylvia Plath reading her poem "Tulips".
I did not realize she was also an artist.
4 comments:
Formerly I had been fond of tulips, but the angsty teen girl part of the large dude that I actually am feels some ambivalence now. I hadn't ever noticed Plath's lisp before. I imagine her named spelled "Plass" now.
What lisssssPaaa?
Odd. I didn't choose to listen to the clip, but read the poem instead, then I listened (curious about the lisp) and thought I liked the voice in my mind's ear better. But . . . I don't particularly like poetry, because too often I don't get it. But like Plath's visual artwork, her drawings (did you see them?) this was very clear and drawn out just right, for me, and I really liked it.
I was surprised by the drawings, that they were so technically proficient and also that they were not nearly as dark or challenging as her poems. And I haven't yet heard a poet who can read her/his own work except maybe Dylan Thomas.
Post a Comment