Olds and Sexton

I have every book of poems that Sharon Olds has published. As I've said, she's my mentor when it comes to amazing poetry. I'll share one of my favorites (one of my MANY favorites) from her book THE FATHER.

CLOSE TO DEATH

Always, now, I feel it, a steady
even pressure, all over my body,
as if I were held in a flower-press.
I am waiting for the phone to ring,
they will say it and I will not be ready,
I do not have a place prepared,
I do not know what will happen to him
or where he will go. I always thought
I had a salvation for him, hidden,
even from myself, in my chest. But when the phone rings,
I don't know who he will be, then,
or where, I have nothing for him, no net,
no heaven to catch him-he taught me only
the earth, night, sleep, the male
body in its beauty and fearsomeness,
he set up that landscape for me
to go to him in, and I will go to him
and give to him, what he gave me I will give him,
the earth, night, sleep, beauty, fear.

~~~~Sharon Olds



And...from one of my two favorite, most intense, possibly, most unstable confessional poets, THE RISK by Anne Sexton. Both Sexton and Plath, my other favorite, were, in spite of being unstable, suicidal and immensely self-centered, were incredible talents. Often harsh and rarely subtle, their images seem to bleed into the pages.


THE RISK


When a daughter tries suicide
and the chimney falls down like a drunk
and the dog chews her tail off
and the kitchen blows up its shiny kettle
and the vacuum cleaner swallows its bag
and the toilet washes itself in tears
and the bathroom scales weigh in the ghost
of the grandmother and the windows,
those sky pieces , ride out like boats
and the grass rolls down the driveway
and the mother lies down on her marriage bed
and eats up her heart like two eggs.


~~~~~~ Anne Sexton