You're
Clownlike, happiest on your hands,
Feet to the stars, and moon-skulled,
Gilled like a fish. A common-sense
Thumbs-down on the dodo's mode.
Wrapped up in yourself like a spool,
Trawling your dark, as owls do.
Mute as a turnip from the Fourth
Of July to All Fools' Day,
O high-riser, my little loaf.
Vague as fog and looked for like mail.
Farther off than Australia.
Bent-backed Atlas, our traveled prawn.
Snug as a bud and at home
Like a sprat in a pickle jug.
A creel of eels, all ripples.
Jumpy as a Mexican bean.
Right, like a well-done sum.
A clean slate, with your own face on.
Sylvia Plath
This poem appears right next to the horrific "Daddy" in the collection Ariel and Other Poems codged together by Ted Hughes for publication after Plath's death.
2 comments:
No, but thanks to advaces in medical science (such as cloning) there may well be mothers without any father (even as a 'sperm donor') in the future.
Heck, one could even imagine a world (say in 3000 A.D.) where only women will populate the planet. Not saying I think that is likely, but certainly sooner or later you and I will be described by someone as 'obsolete and unnecessary,' and it won't be a comment about our age.
There are those who theorize that the Y-chromosome and sexual reproduction are anomolies, and that yes, indeed, other reproductive strategies may someday attain pre-eminence among large organisms.
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