Sylvia Plath - Daddy

Daddy

You do not do, you do not do

Any more, black shoe 

In which I have lived like a foot 

For thirty years, poor and white, 

Barely daring to breathe or Achoo. 

Daddy, I have had to kill you. 

You died before I had time-- 

Marble-heavy, a bag full of God, 

Ghastly statue with one gray toe 

Big as a Frisco seal 

And a head in the freakish Atlantic 

Where it pours bean green over blue 

In the waters off beautiful Nauset. 

I used to pray to recover you. 

Ach, du. 

In the German tongue, in the Polish town 

Scraped flat by the roller 

Of wars, wars, wars. 

But the name of the town is common. 

My Polack friend 

Says there are a dozen or two. 

So I never could tell where you 

Put your foot, your root, 

I never could talk to you. 

The tongue stuck in my jaw. 

It stuck in a barb wire snare. 

Ich, ich, ich, ich, 

I could hardly speak. 

I thought every German was you. 

And the language obscene 

An engine, an engine 

Chuffing me off like a Jew. 

A Jew to Dachau, Auschwitz, Belsen. 

I began to talk like a Jew. 

I think I may well be a Jew. 

The snows of the Tyrol, the clear beer of Vienna 

Are not very pure or true. 

With my gipsy ancestress and my weird luck 

And my Taroc pack and my Taroc pack 

I may be a bit of a Jew. 

I have always been scared of you, 

With your Luftwaffe, your gobbledygoo. 

And your neat mustache 

And your Aryan eye, bright blue. 

Panzer-man, panzer-man, O You-- 

Not God but a swastika 

So black no sky could squeak through. 

Every woman adores a Fascist, 

The boot in the face, the brute 

Brute heart of a brute like you. 

You stand at the blackboard, daddy, 

In the picture I have of you, 

A cleft in your chin instead of your foot 

But no less a devil for that, no not 

Any less the black man who 

Bit my pretty red heart in two. 

I was ten when they buried you. 

At twenty I tried to die 

And get back, back, back to you. 

I thought even the bones would do.

But they pulled me out of the sack, 

And they stuck me together with glue. 

And then I knew what to do. 

I made a model of you, 

A man in black with a Meinkampf look 

And a love of the rack and the screw. 

And I said I do, I do. 

So daddy, I'm finally through. 

The black telephone's off at the root, 

The voices just can't worm through.

If I've killed one man, I've killed two-- 

The vampire who said he was you 

And drank my blood for a year, 

Seven years, if you want to know. 

Daddy, you can lie back now. 

There's a stake in your fat black heart 

And the villagers never liked you. 

They are dancing and stamping on you. 

They always knew it was you. 

Daddy, daddy, you bastard, I'm through.


From The Collected Poems by Sylvia Plath, Harper & Row 1981


So this poem has to be one of my favorite poems by Sylvia Plath. I know it seems creepy and almost masochistic, but hidden deep in the dark prose is a little bead of hope. Much of this poem is about the way the speaker's father was abusive, so she created herself "a model of you" and "said I do, I do." In essence, her father was abusive, so she found herself an abusive husband. The little grain of hope comes from the end, with the line "I'm finally through." This point turns the abuse from the present to the past, and makes it seem that she has broken off her relationship with this abusive husband. She also seems happy about it, acknowledging that "Daddy, you can lie back now," indicating that her father no longer controls her life. I think anyone who finds themselves in an abusive relationship can take solace in this poem, realizing that other people have been in the same situation, and perhaps for the same reason. These people were also able to find a way out of these relationships, so it is not a fruitless endeavor to work to better your life. Take heart, ye emburdoned friends, and carry thyselves to new and magnificent heights! (I have no idea why I decided to wax into Olde English, but it somehow fit the mood. I'm also writing this while listening to the Lord of the Rings soundtrack, so that might have something to do with it.)

Anyway, another lesson I like to take from this poem is that even from the darkest things, we can still take something positive. This is an exceptionally dark poem; even so, it has a positive outlook in the end where people are able to better themselves, no matter the situation. I feel like this is a good way of thinking about things, no matter the situation. I hope all of you enjoy the rest of this wonderful Thursday and the rest of Poetry Month!

Signing off ~Sam Zimmerman

Shel Silverstein: Two Boxes

Two boxes met upon the road,

Said one box unto the other,

"If I'm a box,

And you're a box,

Then you must be my brother.

Our sides are thin,

We're cavin' in,

And we must get no thinner."

And so two boxes, hand in hand,

Went home to have their dinner.

from his collection of poems Where the Sidewalk Ends

So I definitely knew I wanted to start this project out with Shel Silverstein, as he is one of my favorite poets and probably has had the largest impact on my life. My older sister Jess owned all three of his poem collection (Where the Sidewalk Ends, A Light in the Attic, and Falling Up) along with Lafcadio, the Lion Who Shot Back. Lafcadio is one of my three favorite stories ever because of the way my adopted brother Brian reads it, with a different voice for every character, as there are quite a few. I was the Saludictorian at my school and therefore had to give a speech, and if my speech could've been said to be about anything then it was Shel Silverstein's poem "Ations", which I chose because 1) I loved Shel Silvestein and wanted to use something from him (totally my reason for also quoting Bruce Springsteen and Ray Bradbury in that speech, no use denying it) 2) it was simple, had a graduation-y theme, and I thought it'd go over well while still almost making a point (my speech didn't really have one. I said before writing it that I just wanted to thank some people and sit down, so instead what I did was thank some people, quote some people, then sit down, because that more or less constitutes a speech. I don't like a lot of attention on me all at once, so public speaking's a nightmare). 

Shel Silverstein, in my opinion, is kind of like the Pixar of poets. You can be a kid and love the quick-shooting, marshmallow loving Lafcadio mentioned earlier or an adult pondering the identity issues it raises and what it means to be or not be part of a society, I guess. Likewise you can be a kid terrified of Lotso and wanting Woody and Buzz to save the day, or you can be a college student/parent sobbing your eyes out about the idea of childhood being over. "Two Boxes" is a simple poem that really seems to say a lot. A box is a box is a box is a box - "then you must be my brother,". And people are people are people are people. A long repetitive tautology, sure, but if I'm a person and you're a person then you must be my brother. I'm really sick of University Physics and a lot of time I don't know how to deal with people and I'm probably not really eating all that well and I simultaneously want this quarter to be over but am dreading going back to my home town- my sides are getting kind of thin. Other people have crazy M&P midterms or are working two jobs and are finding it hard to deal with people, or they're probably not sleeping well and they're probably really anxious and I don't think people have been treating them too well lately or ever- their sides can't get no thinner. But I'm a box and you're a box so you must be my brother.

I think I told somebody once that every work of fiction is about the human condition, and what do you know here I am talking about it on page one. All of us are struggling but we're getting through it together- the human condition.

I am also probably too long winded and rambling to have been responsibly given a blog page. I don't see this stopping any time before May though.