Poem by Sylvia Plath

Recantation

'Tea leaves I've given up,
And that crooked line
On the queen's palm
Is no more my concern.
On my black pilgrimage
This moon-pocked crystal ball
Will break before it help;
Rather than croak out
What's to come,
My darling ravens are flown.

'Forswear those freezing tricks of sight
And all else I've taught
Against the flower in the blood:
Not wealth nor wisdom stands
Above the simple vein,
The straight mouth.
Go to your greenhorn youth
Before time ends
And do good
With your white hands."

1. In Plaster
2. Black Pine Tree in an Orange Light
3. A Winter Ship
4. The Snowman on the Moor
5. Prologue to Spring

Print

1608 Views

Last Poems

To Russian version