Spring is here!

April 17th, 2009. Published under poetry. 4 Comments.

It’s incredible how even the scraggliest and  ugliest of  bushes in our  apartment  garden can put on a head-turning  show in springtime

Seeing all these pretty things everywhere reminds me of a  poem written by Sylvia Plath. Two years ago, I asked my sister to read it. When she was done, she returned it to me apologizing that she wasn’t the poetic type so she couldn’t understand it. This post is an attempt to simplify the poem’s message for the benefit of my sister and for all the non-poetic types out there.

Spinster

by Sylvia Plath

Now this particular girl

During a ceremonious April walk

With her latest suitor

Found herself, of a sudden, intolerably struck

By the birds’ irregular babel

And the leaves litter.

By this tumult afflicted, she

Observed her lover’s gestures unbalance the air,

His gait stray uneven

Through a rank wilderness of fern and flower.

She judged petals in disarray,

The whole season sloven.

How she longed for winter then! -

Scrupulously austere in its order

Of white and black

Ice and rock, each sentiment within border,

Exact as a snowflake.

But here — a burgeoning

Unruly enough to pitch her five queenly wits

Into a vulgar motley–

A treason not to be borne. Let idiots

Reel giddy in bedlam spring:

She withdrew neatly.

And round her house she set

Such a barricade of barb and check

Against mutinous weather

As no mere insurgent man could hope to break

With curse, fist, threat

Or love, either.

Once upon a time , there was a girl. She took a walk with her “latest suitor”, a phrase suggesting that she’s had other suitors in the past. (picky girl) As they walked, she noticed the birds calling to each other. Unlike most people, she didn’t enjoy the sound they made. It was just “babel” to her, confused noise, a racket.  When she looked at the man beside her she noted how ungraceful his movements were as he manuevered his way  through the dense growth. She was turned off.  She thought that the whole  spring season was just one big mess.

Third stanza tells of how she prefers winter and its simple, neat, and well-defined colors. Just white and black. (Can’t really blame her. There are many colors out there I can’t properly identify. Turquoise is one. Gosh, I can’t even spell it with confidence!) You can’t go wrong with white and black. Then suddenly in the 4th line the poem shifts. It’s not talking about seasons anymore, but about the spinster’s heart. She’s the type of person who likes to keep her emotions under control, “each sentiment within border”. She’s ice (cold) and rock (hard). In her heart she wants order, discipline, and exactness–reason symbolized by winter. Clearly she is Plato’s disciple.

After talking about winter the author brings the reader’s attention back to spring. If the spinster views winter as symbolizing reason, then spring and all its tumult symbolizes emotions. The flourishing life  all around her muddles and upsets her senses.  Makes her head spin. Such disorganized growth is offensive to her. No, she’s not crazy enough to let her guard down and join the birds, the bees, and the salamanders in their springtime mayhem. “She withdrew neatly”. The author stresses the idea of order and neatness again. (On top of being a killjoy, the spinster could probably have OCD, too.) She pulls into herself, puts up walls around her “house” or heart for protection. No man can hurt her. The walls keep bad elements out. Sadly, this security system also keeps love from coming in.